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viennakarma · 3 months

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Happiness is a butterfly

Fernando Alonso x Reader

Summary: He wants you but he can't have you. But when a fatal crash happens, he realizes maybe he should just take the jump, before it's too late.

Word count: 6.4k

Tags: Female reader, teammate reader, smut, oral, angst, crash, very remorseful nano, cursing, mostly fernando pov, fernando is in denial, age gap (not defined), hurt/comfort, brief mention of Jules Bianchi, happy ending, not beta read

Relationships: Fernando Alonso x Reader

Notes: LISTEN I wish I could control my creative brain but I can’t. *taps mic* Ok, so, who's ready for our little monthly crying session? This actually came to me in a dream after I listened to Happiness is a butterfly, and I ended up incorporating some of the lyrics in the story. I was only contemplating writing this when Anon sent this request asking for angst after a big fight, and I thought it goes perfectly with what I had in mind.

Hope it's to your liking, Anon!

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“Fernando,” You whispered like it wasn’t wrong, like his name was a prayer.

Fernando knew it was wrong, not only because you were a driver and his teammate, but also because you were way too young for him. But whenever you two were like that, you in his arms, it felt so right, so perfect.

Sometimes he wondered to himself if he took advantage of you. Because ever since you first met, you looked at him with big shiny eyes, like you were facing a hero. He knew you were a fan of his, but then again, most of the younger drivers were. But when you two became teammates and got closer, he’d notice how your eyes would find his first thing after entering any room. Whenever you two had chats alone, you’d smile at him in a specific way you didn’t smile at anyone else, blush creeping up your face.

It was so easy to be enchanted by you, by your kindness and willingness. Fernando was drawn to you like a moth to flame, only you didn’t burn him. You were kind to everyone and very talkative, and for a while, Fernando wondered how you managed to get into Formula 1 and keep your spirit intact. Everyone called you a social butterfly. Then he started calling you Mariposa, as a sweet nickname, and he explained to you it meant “Butterfly”.

You two were always together, being teammates, so it didn’t take long for the dynamic shift. Soon, there were longing looks and lingering touches. The way Fernando would always touch the small of your back for a little too long when talking to you, or the way you lean too close whenever talking to him, or the way his eyes stare at your lips every opportunity. Or when you finished a good race and the first thing you’d do was jump on his arms. How you’d always knock three times on his helmet right before going off to the race, he started reciprocating the gesture, since he knew it was probably your thing for good luck or something.

Things went like that for too long, and neither of you were brave enough to take the jump, as you called it.

That until fate put you face to face during summer break. You were in Mallorca with a bunch of your friends for a girls trip in a resort by the sea. You were having brunch when you spotted Fernando at the same time he spotted you, his eyebrows raising in surprise, he muttered something to the people with him that looked like his family members, before coming to you.

“Mariposa!” He hugged you softly.

“Hi! Good to see you!” You chirped, nervously.

Fernando blatantly checked you out. You were wearing simple bikinis and a light beach robe. You were tanned, hair wild and cheeks red like you had come straight out of one of his wet dreams.

“Enjoying summer break?” He asked.

“Yeah, with my friends,” You pointed to where they waited for you at the table, “will you be here for long?”

“No, my family is going back today and I’m leaving tomorrow. We’ve been here for a few days already.”

You waved him goodbye after a quick chat. That night, the weather, the breeze and the empty villa tempted him into calling you. He didn’t want to be that guy so he resisted the urge, instead going for a walk by the beach, alone. As fate would have it, he found you at a small beach party with your friends, dancing and drinking.

Like a magnet, your eyes found his, and you said something to your friends before walking up to him.

“You came to the party?” You asked.

“No, I was just taking a walk and passed by,” He shrugged, and started walking away “I’ll let you go back to your friends.”

“No! No- I mean- Can I walk with you?” You asked and he just nodded.

You two walked away by the shore, the small waves crashing over your feet, and you two chatting about the island and all the adventures you got to go.

“So you went diving, surfing? Everything?”

“I have always been kind of a scaredy-cat, especially as a kid. My dad used to tell me ‘you just have to breathe ten seconds of courage and take the jump’. Funnily, racing was the only thing I wasn’t afraid of. I’m in control, me and the car are one.”

He listened to you for a long while, his eyes focused on the way the wind picked up your hair, your dress flowy in the wind and your bikini top peeking from under the neckline. You were looking delicious, he had to admit. You always were, but now, after spending the whole day under the sun, your skin was golden and glowy, and he imagined himself biting into your shoulder and kissing up your neck.

When you two finally stopped by the villa, Fernando looked at you attentively.

“Won’t your boyfriend be worried about you?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend,” you shook your head knowing that he was just trying to find out if you had someone.

“You don’t? Well you’re pretty and nice, I thought you’d have one by now.”

“You think I’m pretty?” You asked, blushing which made him chuckle.

“You know you are stunning.”

“Well, I know I’m pretty, I just didn’t know if I am pretty enough for you.”

“Mariposa,” his voice had a tone of reprimand, but his eyes falling down your cleavage and body, betrayed him.

“Just one kiss?” You asked, pouting, “and we don’t even have to talk about it after.”

“I can’t.”

“But you want to?” You asked, full of hope.

“We should not,” he whispered as you closed the distance to his face, your face barely centimeters from his, lips dangerously close.

“We could just,” you tried to come up with an argument, but your lips brushed his beard and you lost all train of thought.

“If we start, I will not be able to stop,” he mumbled, trying so hard to refrain himself.

“Then don’t.”

That’s all it took for him to press his fingers to your nape, pulling you in and smashing his lips to yours. And it felt divine, like nothing he had ever done before, you were sweet and the harder he kissed you, the more pliant you got in his arms, sighing and moaning softly as his hand found home over your ass, pressing firmly until your whole body was flush to his.

“Fernando,” you whispered, his lips going down your neck, his beard making goosebumps raise on your skin.

Then you walked inside without really breaking apart. Fernando pulled your dress from your body, staring at you in your bikini.

“This is tiny,” he said, hooking a finger by the string on the sides of the bottom.

You smiled some way you hoped was seductive, taking a step back so he could see you fully as you pulled the strings, letting your bikini top fall to the floor, followed by the bottom soon after.

Soon he had you bent over the back of the sofa, holding onto the seat for dear life as he knelt behind you and ate you out, fingering you ass all the way to a mind blowing orgasm. Then he fucked you senseless, whispering dirty nothings into your ear, switching English and Spanish back and forth. He slapped your ass until it was stinging, whispering about your “tempting tiny bikini”. He had you groaning, drooling against the sofa until your toes curled and you came around his cock.

“Nano… Fuck-” you moaned feeling him cumming too.

He cuddled you, both of you falling on the sofa, spent.

“Why were we holding back? We should’ve done this a long time ago.” You said, lips brushing his beard.

He didn’t answer because he knew why he had been holding back. You were young, sometimes naive, and his teammate. It was double the trouble. But he didn’t allow himself to wallow in those feelings, rather focusing on the feel of you naked in his arms.

“You know what we should do? Stay here a bit longer,” you rose from his chest, eyes glinting mischievously, “we should extend our stay here.”

“Just you and me?”

“Just us,” you whispered, planting a kiss on his chest.

And so you stayed with him. You sent your friends to Ibiza as a gift and Fernando extended his rent on the villa. You’d spend the day lazing around, cooking together and going to the beach or the pool. You played tennis and trained together in the small gym. You made love on every possible surface of that whole villa, which left you spent and satisfied every single day.

And you talked. Fernando considered you to be one of the closests people to him on the grid, but still, he learned so much more about you, about your mental strength to rise and thrive in motorsport. And you were clever and witty, joking around him, talking about life and all your dreams. And he could hear you for hours on end, never getting tired of you.

Unfortunately, your little time of uninterrupted happiness had to end. With a heavy heart, you kissed him goodbye, both of you aware that things would never go back to the way they were before summer break. But you two were also too scared to name anything, or to ruin whatever this dynamic was.

But you left Mallorca admitting to yourself that you had fallen in love even deeper.

You tried to keep texting and calling him, but you usually were in very different time zones so the texts were few and far between. Fernando even sent you a sweet text on your birthday a few of days later.

There was a gala by the end of summer break almost three weeks later, hosted by the FIA, it was mostly for mingling, and most drivers usually went, especially those trying to keep an image to the big shots.

Fernando went there because he rarely missed it. And maybe because he knew you would be there too, and maybe he could leave with you.

You arrived a little late, stunning in a green gown, with a tight corset and a big slit showing your leg. Fernando watched as you made rounds, greeting people and old men, other drivers that were your friends and their wives or girlfriends. You eventually made your way to Fernando, and he proudly waited for you when you walked up to him, the most beautiful smile adorning your lips and eyes shining just as much as the diamonds on your earrings.

“You’re beautiful, mariposa.” Fernando whispered.

“Thank you, you look handsome too. Love me a man in a tuxedo.” You whispered back conspiratorially, winking at him.

You two chatted for a little, watching the people around. You told him everything you did during summer break after you two parted ways in Mallorca. When the slow music started, you watched the couples getting to the dancefloor.

“Nano, can we dance?” You asked. He just stiffened, face unsure.

“Hm, I’m not sure.”

“Nobody will mind, we’re teammates,” you shrugged.

“I don’t think it's a good idea,” He looked at your face, still staring longingly at the couples slow dancing on the dancefloor. Yearning for something he couldn’t give you.

“Mhm…” You hummed, disappointed. You stood there silent for a couple more minutes, watching the dancefloor. Fernando imagined dancing with you, having you in his arms, listening to your voice, your hand on his shoulder. You cleared your throat for a second, “I’m gonna get a drink.”

You didn’t wait for his response, leaving with long strides to the bar, the opposite side. Fernando’s eyes never left you, he watched as you got a drink and sipped a little, sitting on a bar stool. Some people stopped to greet you quickly. At some point, Charles Leclerc stopped you, whispering something that made you giggle a little, then he offered you a hand, probably inviting you to dance, but you refused politely. You grabbed a second drink and turned on the stool, nursing your drink and still watching the party go on.

You wanted to dance with him, not anyone else.

Eventually, the party died down, and Fernando got close to you again, whispering in your ear to meet him in the most discreet parking lot and then he left. You watched his back as he made his way out. Downing whatever was left of your drink, you stood up, making a quick route to say goodbye to everyone.

Finally, you met Fernando in the car. He had driven himself in his expensive car.

As he drove away in the middle of the night, he put his hand on your thigh under the slit of the dress. You honestly wanted to jump him, to make him stop the car anywhere and just get into it.

Quietly making into his hotel room, you kicked your high heels off and kissed him, not giving him any second before deepening the kiss, pressing your body to his.

“Wait,” he managed to croak out. You took a step back. He went into his luggage and picked a small box, handing it to you, “I know your birthday was two weeks ago, but since I didn’t see you- well, happy birthday.”

“You didn’t have to…” you whispered, opening the box to a beautiful and delicate necklace with a gold butterfly pendant with small diamonds all around the wings, “it’s so beautiful, Fernando.”

“Not as much as you, Mariposa.” He whispered back, taking the necklace, placing you in front of the full body mirror and standing behind you and locking the necklace around your neck.

“Thank you”

He kissed your neck, running a hand down your arm, then kissing your shoulders while pulling the hair pins out of your hair, letting your hair free. He kept leaving hot wet kisses on your skin, calling you “hermosa” and “my mariposa” all while unzipping your dress slowly. You let him do whatever, his hands pushing the corset out until the fabric pooled around your ankles kicking it away too, and you stood in nothing but panties and the necklace.

You gasped, staring at your reflection on the mirror and him behind you, his rough fingertips running over your side, getting to your front and cupping your boobs. You felt soft as his fingers pinched your nipples, making you moan softly.

“You ready to take me?” He asked against your ears.

“Please, Nano,” you moaned his name the way you only said it when you were alone and getting intimate.

“Foot there,” he pointed to a chair. You did as he said, one leg up so he could have better access to your panties.

He pressed his chest to your back, fingers sliding inside your panties to feel your obscene wetness dampening the fabric. His fingers slid right over your clit, spreading your juices all around, before diving into your cunt. You moaned, head lolling back against his shoulder, as he pleasured you nonstop. You had been turned on even since the gala, and the ride to the hotel had been pure torture not being touched. So it didn’t take much for him to build you up, his thumb brushing your clit. Your moaning got louder and with the way he could feel your cunt clenching around his fingers, he knew you were close.

And so he stopped, making you whine. He just chuckled.

“Nano! I was so close!” You pouted.

“Needy girl, get on the bed,” he pointed again, like an order, “you’re cumming around my cock first.”

You sat on the bed slowly, still reeling from almost orgasming. You watched as Fernando started undressing in front of you, so you just ran both hands from his chest down to his thighs, fingers barely touching the straining erection in his pants.

“Don’t get greedy now. Wait.”

With his words, you stopped touching him, leaning back so you could watch him undress. When he finally got rid of all clothing, he leaned, kissing your stomach and up your boobs, mouthing your nipples as his hands pulled your panties, letting you lay down on the edge of the bed. You held his head against your nipples, his eyes finding yours through his eyelashes.

When you were both fully naked, he just held your legs open and sank into your cunt, making you moan loud as you back rose up from the bed.

“Nano- oh, fuck!” You moaned, and pulled by his neck to kiss you.

He kissed you back slowly, patiently contrasting your desperate hands on his shoulder, crawling up his neck, fingertips sinking into his soft hair, as he fucked you slowly, pressing you deliciously into the bed, one hand firmly on the bedrest and the other holding your neck, pressing until you were cumming, his lips sucking hickeys into your skin.

You two were cuddling quietly when you decided to say what you’ve been thinking about ever since Mallorca.

“We should go on a date, Fernando. Take the next step, I really like what we have.”

You could feel him stiffening against you, and you closed your eyes, afraid of what his response would be.

“We can’t, mariposa. You are way younger than me,” He said somberly, “and we’re teammates. This would be too messy for the both of us, but especially for you, who is just starting your career.”

“I don’t mind if that’s the price I need to pay to have you.”

“We can’t take this kind of risk for something we don’t even know it’s real.”

That squeezed your heart and made you angry with his denial.

“Fernando, this is real- You know that!”

“Calling a cab to take you to your hotel,” he said standing up and picking his phone. His tone was cold, detached from you, like you were just some toy for him to have fun with, and now you served your purpose.

“Don’t be like that, Fernando. This is more than just sex,” you got up, covering yourself with the bedsheet because it felt too vulnerable having this conversation naked.

“We can’t be anymore than that. You’re too young to understand.” He said not looking at you.

There was a lump on your throat rapidly forming. He knew you hated when people treated you like you were dumb because you were young.

“Please let us just talk about it-”

“There’s nothing to talk about. This means nothing! Nada!” He exclaimed.

“You don’t mean that. Don’t be a jerk.” Your voice was already wavering.

You stared at his back as he turned around, going to the opposite side of the room, your tears started falling down.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” He finally said but still didn’t look at you.

“I’m already hurt,” you said, picking up your panties from the floor hastily putting them on, realizing how Fernando had helped you with your dress, so you just picked up one of his sweaters and dressed, “do you want me or do you not?”

“I don’t want you.”

“You’re missing good things in life because of fear. Just take the fucking jump, Fernando.”

The next thing he heard was the slamming door behind you.

When he walked back, he noticed you had left the butterfly necklace on the table. Holding the necklace against the palm of his hand, he wondered if he did the right thing or just lost the best thing in his life.

You didn’t text or called him. And he didn’t either. Eventually he texted you, to tell you had “forgot” the necklace, to test the waters.

“You’re the only one who calls me mariposa. This necklace has no meaning to me if you’re not in my life.”

His mind would often wander back to Mallorca, to those few days you and him lived in paradise. Sleeping late, waking up even later, then making love lazily under the sun, sunbathing naked by the pool, and cooking together, training together. There was never silence with you, since you were always talking or singing or playing loud music.

And he missed it. As the weeks progressed and the more race weeks came, you didn’t try to talk to him about the two of you. You were still polite and talkative, usually filling his silence with stories, talks about the track and strategies. You still knocked on his helmet three times before every race, probably a pre race ritual by now.

He missed you. He missed not only the feel of your cunt around his cock, but he missed your loudness, and your laugh. He missed the light in your eyes that was slowly darkening each passing day. Like you were losing hope he would come around and change his mind.

The last race of the season, he was a little late from a meeting, so you were already getting in the car when he came out. Your visor was up, so you just looked at him, and knocked your own helmet three times as a sign to him, who did the same gesture back to you.

By around ⅔ of the race, there was an accident and the red flag was called.

It took maybe two or three minutes until all cars stopped on the pitlane, lined up under the red flag. As Fernando climbed out of the car, he turned around, looking for you, removing his helmet, guard and balaclava, he went inside the garage.

“Where’s Mariposa?” He asked, to one in particular. But then his eyes landed in Martha, your PT, and her eyes were watery as she pointed to the screen.

A sinking feeling expanded in his stomach as he saw your car, that now looked like an unrecognizable wreckage. He dropped his helmet, covering his mouth with a hand. The marshals were all around your burning car, various people with fire extinguishers, trying to lower the fire enough to pull you out.

“Has she responded yet? Did she say anything?” Fernando asked without removing his eyes from the screen.

“No,” Somebody said, somberly.

“She’ll be fine,” Fernando assured, probably trying to convince himself, and his rapid heartbeat. He had seen and had been in many ugly crashes, and in the end, the driver had come out unscathed. He was sure you could manage, you were very strong and stubborn.

When the fire died down enough, a couple of marshals pulled you out, and Fernando’s heart felt like it was stopping as they pulled you out unconscious. The marshals made a small shield around you and carried you to the ambulance.

Looking around, Fernando finally noticed how everyone was horrified by the crash, and all the drivers around seemed pale and worried. It took a couple of minutes for the FIA to decide to keep the race going, setting it to restart 15 minutes later.

“Fernando,” someone called, and he turned to be faced with George and Alex, who were your closest friends on the grid, “any news on her?”

“Not yet,” he paused, trying really hard to not freak out, “Mike went to the hospital with her.”

“That was ugly,” Alex muttered gloomily.

The tree of them stayed silent, eyes on the screen where a replay of your crash. It was probably a mechanical issue, since you were in high speed when the tyres locked, and you visibly couldn’t brake, going straight into the barriers, full force.

“Will-” George started but his voice failed a little and he cleared his throat, “will she be ok?”

“Yes. She’ll be ok.” Fernando said, not only to calm down the two young drivers, but also to convince himself, since no other option was acceptable in his mind.

You had to be fine.

“Fuck it,” Fernando went inside his room, changing quickly into more casual clothes, as he came out, the team was confused, “I’m sorry, but I have to check on her. Martha, come with me.”

He left knowing he would face terrible consequences with the FIA, not only for not going back to the race, but also because he avoided the press to go to the hospital you were taken to.

On the car, on the way to the hospital they had taken you to, his phone rang, and it was Mike, who had been the first one to go with you to the hospital. Fernando supposed Mike would want to tear him a new one for abandoning the race.

But no. Mike wanted to update him, telling you had a concussion that had knocked you out on the spot, inside the car. They were going to check if you had any more injuries with scans and tests.

By the time he got to the hospital, he met with Mike, and with Vince, your friend and manager, they said you were still unconscious and going through all the examinations necessary. The doctors wanted to see if you didn’t have any internal bleeding or fractures. They kept you unconscious during urgent care, hoping you would wake up after the tests and after the meds wear off.

Fernando sat in the waiting room unmoved, his fear eating him inside every minute you had not woken up yet. Martha was tearful the whole time, while Vince was making calls right and left, he got in touch with your family and closest friends. Alberto showed up around an hour after to pick Fernando up to go back to the hotel.

“I am not leaving,” Fernando said.

“Fernando, there’s nothing you can do. Vince said she will probably wake up late morning tomorrow, we can just-”

“I will not leave.”

Fernando’s words left no space for debate. He didn’t have any commitments for the next week. So he stayed after everyone left, waiting for news on his mariposa. He could barely drink the coffee because his stomach was churning with the lack of news. In the middle of the night, finally they finished the tests and they put you in a room.

After bribing his way inside, Fernando was able to get into your room and see you. You were sleeping, looking peaceful in that hospital bed, using an oxygen inhaler.

“Why does she need oxygen?” He asked the nurse checking on you.

“Here it says she inhaled some smoke before the fire was put off,” the woman explained, reading your chart.

“She will be alright, isn’t she?” He asked, his tone audibly worried. The nurse sighed, as if she didn’t want to say her next words.

“We can’t tell just yet. For now the scans and tests show she is fine, but we can only tell for sure after she wakes up.”

She left Fernando behind with dread consuming his every thought.

As he stared at your unconscious body on the bed, he couldn’t help but remember when you slept with him in Mallorca. Your naked body tangled with the blankets, hair splayed on the pillows and tanned limbs looking for him even in sleep, hugging him and keeping him in bed with you longer than he usually did. He sat by the bed, hand holding yours, running his thumb over your cold knuckles.

The remorse was eating him alive. You had to be alright. You had to wake up soon and laugh at his worried face, joking that you’re tougher than you look. Giving him those eyes. He couldn’t bear not looking at your eyes again, that would break him apart one last time.

Because you could have been his the whole time. He could have slept with you in his arms more often than not. He could have been stealing your kisses in dark corners and going out for dinner after late team meetings. He could’ve received random cute selfies from you throughout his day. He could’ve whispered “I love you” into your skin every night. Only he didn’t.

His last words to you were “I don’t want you” and he couldn’t take it if those were his last words for you ever. He never let himself admit to you that he had fallen. That he was absolutely crazy for you, that he loved you even before you ever kissed him.

He was about to spiral in guilt when your sister arrived in the early morning. She visibly didn’t expect Fernando there, holding her sister’s hand.

“I just talked to the doctor,” Mila, your sister, muttered.

“He said the meds will wear off later today,” Fernando said.

“You can go rest now, come back later.” Mila offered. Didn’t sound like she wanted him specifically out, but more out of worry.

“No, I- I want to stay until she’s awake.”

“Fernando, she wouldn’t want you to wear yourself thin because of her,” The way Mila said the words, it left a little unsaid.

“You know?” Was all he asked. Do you know about us? What do you think? What did she say about me? But Mila just nodded, she didn’t look judgemental.

“I know.”

He was about to leave to at least shower and eat something before coming back. As Mila got closer to your sleeping form, Fernando stood back and your sister touched your hand. Then she knocked three times on the bedside table. Fernando frowned.

“Why did you do that?” He asked Mila.

“When we were kids in karting, Dad used to do that to our helmets before races, each knock means a word. ‘I love you’, and with time it just became a silly habit of hers,” Mila explained.

Fernando’s heart twisted inside, eyes watering.

Knock. I. Knock. Love. Knock. You.

You had been doing the knocks to him for months, even before the summer break.

He left the room without a word, breathing in and out to stop the tears that threatened to spill from his eyes. He wasn’t an emotional man by any means, but the knowledge that you have been loving him for so long, broke his heart.

After going back to the hotel to shower and eat, he went knocking in Alberto’s room when he noticed he didn’t have his phone anywhere in sight ever since before the race had started. Like predicted, Alberto had his phone.

In his suite, Fernando unlocked his phone to hundreds of notifications, a lot from other drivers, asking for news about you, since not the Formula 1 or the FIA had released any notes about your condition. After shooting a few answers to the other drivers, he finally saw one notification, saying you had left him a voicemail the day before. From the time stamp, it was a bit before the race.

Wide eyed, he pressed play on the voicemail.

“Hey, I’m about to go out in the car, but I guess I just breathed 10 seconds of courage, well not enough to wait to say it to you face to face,” you giggled nervously, “but what I mean to say is, I love you. Probably not what you wanted to hear, but I do love you. And I know you don’t feel the same, but maybe you could… I don’t know, maybe you could take a chance on me. I know your reservations about the world, but… We should take the jump. I can make you really happy if you let me. And maybe one day you will grow to love me- god, that last part was pathetic- Shit- How do I delete this?” There was noise as if you were struggling with the phone and then someone called your name far away, “one second!” you told the person, “shit, I gotta go. Just please, can we talk over the winter break? I guess what I mean is that-” Then the beep ended the message, cutting your voicemail off.

He pressed play a couple more times, until he could breathe again, your voice offering some sense of peace to his mind. You were willing to have him, even after he kicked you out of his hotel room, even after he pretty much ignored your history all these past few months.

It would be alright. You would wake up, he would tell you he loved you and he was so sorry that he had wasted so much time being afraid of what people may think or how the world might treat you.

Only you didn’t.

You didn’t wake up after the meds wore off. And Fernando, your sister, Vince and Martha were all shocked when the doctor said it was possible you were in a coma.

“Everything seems ok, but she’s not waking up. Sometimes the body takes a little more time to recover from traumas like this.”

“When-” Mila’s voice failed, tears streaming down her face, “when do you believe she could wake up?”

“We can’t pinpoint that with precision,” the doctor answered.

“Get all the tests redone,” Fernando said suddenly, “maybe you missed something.”

“But-”

“I’ll pay for it.”

That’s all he said before leaving and entering a toilet by the waiting room. His chest heaving, he watered his shaky hands to try and calm down. You didn’t wake up. They weren’t sure when or if you would wake up. And, fuck, Fernando had seen that before with Jules, who was comatose for months before passing away.

He remembered the blinding pain of losing a friend and he couldn’t bear losing the love of his life too. Fernando stayed in the stall for a while, trying to calm down his terrified thoughts.

When he went back, your sister was still crying, being comforted by Vince.

“Fernando, can you stay here while we call my family?” Mila asked, and Fernando nodded.

As they left, Fernando sat by your side, holding your hand. With his thumb running over the back of your hand, he looked at your face.

“I don’t want you to go,” he whispered, “I need you here. There’s still so much for you here. Please, I just need you to fight a little more, yes? You have always been stubborn.”

He waited for some kind of miracle, for you to wake up, for your eyes to find him like they always did even in a crowded room.

“When you recover, we will go out, on a proper date, and we’ll dance, like you wanted to. We’ll hold hands and I’ll take you to meet my family.” He kissed the back of your hand softly, “Wake up, Mariposa.”

He stayed there the whole day, letting your sister go find a hotel to stay and get some sleep. Then at night, she came back, assuring Fernando that he should go to sleep too, she knew he was more than a day and a half awake. Back at the hotel, he showered the smell of hospital off and made some calls to take care of his businesses. He texted George and Alex to update them. He also talked to his family, giving updates on his teammate, but not prolonging the chat as to not risk breaking down because of the state his mariposa was in the hospital. Then he went to sleep after a quick dinner, exhausted enough to sleep fairly quickly.

He managed to sleep the whole night, going in and off dreams of you, his brain probably too worried to really forget, even unconscious. He woke up at dawn, going back to the hospital so your sister could leave to rest.

Fernando checked on you first thing, and you were still unconscious, but your sister was on the phone talking to your parents, so he just left to give her a little privacy. He went into the cafeteria and drank a small cup of coffee.

As he went back, he noticed how agitated Vince looked on the phone right outside your room.

“Vince, what happened?” He asked, dreading that the worse had happened in the few minutes he was away.

“She woke up!”

Fernando’s eyes welled up with tears as he opened the door.

“-No, no, don’t talk just yet. Let’s wait for the doctor,” you sister said to you, then both of them looked at Fernando, who looked rooted to the spot, “Fernando! She woke up!” Your sister said through happy tears.

Your sister hugged again, kissing your head, whispering how she loved you all while Fernando stood there, trying to will his limbs to move. Then the doctor and a nurse came, asking you all to leave so he could examine you.

He waited outside as your sister went on the phone with the good news to your family again. Then the doctor came out, announcing you were looking good, and apparently no sequelae but they would still keep you for a few more days for close examination and to make sure everything was alright.

Barely registering anything, Fernando just entered your room, and you smiled at him. You smiled. Your eyes shining bright like you had just woken up from a simple nap.

And then he cried. Fully cried for the first time since the accident, like the relief of seeing you alive and well broke the dam of the tears he had been trying to hold back. And he could breathe again. Covering his face with both hands, he tried to get himself in control but he only stopped when he heard you.

“Na-” your voice was hoarse, “-no.”

“No, don’t talk yet. The nurse said your throat might feel a little dry.” He managed to subside his tears enough to talk.

When he sat down on the chair, you lifted your hand to hold his face. You were still a bit weak, but you wiped his face of the tears. He held your hand with both of his, kissing your palm.

“You gave us quite the scare,” Fernando said with a small smile. You smiled back, looking sleepy, “I thought I was going to lose you.”

You shook your head minimally but your eyes had that mischievous glint, like you were thinking of a silly joke about how tough you actually are.

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry for making you think I don’t love you, when I really do. I have for the longest time. We’ll make it work, however you want,” he just dumped the words, not wanting to lose another precious second not being yours, “soy tuyo, Mariposa. Te amo, mi amor.”

You just held his hand, squeezing it slowly three times. I. Love. You.

#f1 fanfic #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #f1 fic #f1 #formula 1 #fernando alonso x reader #fernando alonso x you #fernando alonso #formula one #Spotify

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waynes-multiverse · 9 days

Note

Ok hear me out. I got this idea after the episode of Dean getting his "virginity" back and hooking up with the porn star when he's digging through her dresser and finds the DVD of her ANYWAY

Best friend Dean who's been pining after you for sooo long but doesn't want to fuck it up and lose you. You're hanging out when you ask him to go grab something from your room and he's digging through your drawers looking and accidentally comes across some lingerie and now it's days later and he's so hot and bothered cuz he can't think of anything else (the boy has a serious panty kink lets be honest) and you catch him in your room going through your drawers again and OH

A/N: As I warned y'all, this is a longer DD because, well, the prompt was long, so it's not really my fault. All that backstory took on a life of its own, but I think no one will be mad about it 😅 Again, I had tons of fun with this one! You'll see 🤣

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Female!Reader

Warnings: +18/NSWF, a ridiculous heat wave, friends to lovers (Wayne's Version), crack, a panty kink, some sneaky fluff, and some hot lovin' aka smut (oral f & face sitting)

Word Count: 4.5k (whoops)

Main Masterlist || Dirty Drabbles

Cruel Summer

“You open the beaches on the 4th of July, it’s like ringing the dinner bell for Christ’s sake…”

As Jaws flickered across the screen in the Dean Cave, the green-eyed hunter adjusted himself in his seat. Usually, he had perfect control over himself and his feelings for you.

But on some days – like today – when you sat right next to him on the couch in nothing but a loose t-shirt and some short sweatpants, fanning yourself with an old magazine of Busty Asian Beauties as beads of salty sweat collected on your forehead and trickled down your neck, you made it hard for him.

“God, I’m so hot,” you sighed exhaustively and sunk further into the couch cushions, lifting your shirt from your sticky skin to let some cool air to your boobs as a heat wave ravaged through Kansas.

Painfully hard.

“Dean?” You pouted with your best puppy dog look at your best friend.

“Huh?” Dean was in trance, watching you more than the movie, always on the edge of getting caught one of these days.

“We’re out of Sour Patch Kids. I have more in my nightstand. Can you get them for me please?” you asked sweetly. “I don’t wanna move. I might actually die from heat exhaustion.”

Dean sighed and wordlessly rose from his seat. He knew you always kept an array of salty and sweet midnight snacks in your room in case you got hungry and didn’t want to wander into the kitchen in the middle of the night.

Moreover, he was grateful for the break. God knows he couldn’t stand to be around you any longer, or he would’ve been too tempted to rip your clothes off and really make you sweat.

I’ll show her a damn heat exhaustion, he thought with a scoff.

Hastily grabbing the desired snack, his green eyes then caught something red and lacy sticking out from the first drawer of your dresser. The hunter knew the decent and honest thing would’ve been to just keep moving and leave your godforsaken room.

Turn around, as Bonnie Tyler sang. But for some reason, his bright eyes couldn’t resist, his curiosity overtaking him.

Dean opened the drawer with the intention to push the naughty little clothing item back into its place and out of sight. Get rid of the temptation, so to speak. It sounded like the perfect loophole. He got to touch it and look at it, but for a very heroic and noble reason – not because he was a creepy perv, violating his best friend’s privacy.

On some level, Dean knew he’d never stand a chance with you. He wasn’t good enough. He had so much baggage all his suitcases wouldn’t even fit into the bunker.

A damn touch of a pair of panties you weren’t even wearing was all he would ever get from you.

But then his fingers touched the soft and see-through material, his pads tracing every delicate scarlet thread with precision and care. It was game over for him then and there, cursing himself internally for not resisting harder as his cock twitched joyfully in his jeans.

Dean had laid his eyes on you the second you strolled with swinging hips into that diner in Wichita for your very first case together, a werewolf hunt six years ago. And he had managed to get by without an incident for years since then, even when you moved into the bunker, being rather proud of that achievement. He never wanted to lose you as a friend and didn’t dare to cross a line. Ever.

Recently, though, it became more difficult to keep his distance and not let his thoughts wander. His feelings were magma that slowly had filled a volcano over the years. Each time you did something sexy or sweet or goofy or smart, another drop was added. And now, that damn fire mountain was overdue for an eruption – no thanks to that stupid heat wave.

“Thanks,” you said absentmindedly as the hunter handed you the candy but didn’t settle back down. Instead, he stood behind the sofa and leaned his hands on the backrest.

What you didn’t know, though, was that Dean was sporting quite the boner and wouldn’t dare to come into your line of view. He was surprised he could even walk up straight and not like a caveman early in the evolution.

A hunter gathering panties.

“I’m gonna hit the hay,” he told you with a somber clear of his throat. As the fan carried a breeze of your perfume to his nose, his grip tightened on the couch.

You turned in your seat and looked over your shoulder at him, raising a surprised brow. “Already? But the movie’s not over.”

“Yeah, I’m beat,” he excused and tried his best not to look strained. He forced a tight smile to his lips while his little dude celebrated Spring Break in his jeans. “‘Sides, we’ve seen Jaws like a million times now, Y/N.”

It was a cherished summer tradition between the two of you, watching it every 4th of July.

“I guess so.” You shrugged disappointedly, watching your best friend retreat to his room. Truth was, you loved spending time with Dean and held those little traditions close to your heart.

The Winchesters were your family, the only one you ever had. And while some families wore matching pajamas on Christmas morning, you watched the first two Die Hard movies. You would watch Dean’s favorite horror movies on Halloween. Sixteen Candles and High Fidelity on your birthday, Tombstone and The Great Escape on Dean’s, and some lame-ass foreign language documentaries that you both snored through on Sam’s.

Valentine’s Day was a dreaded non-holiday for all three of you, but for the past four years, someone would leave a box of chocolate in front of your door. The salted caramel ones would always be missing, and it always came with the same Forrest Gump quote:

I’m not a smart man, but I know what love is.

You knew the anonymous someone was Dean, and you knew he meant it as a joke. Still, you clung to those little traditions. They might seem silly and stupid to some, but to you, they were your lifeline in a world full of darkness.

So, you felt rather saddened Dean didn’t seem to honor them anymore. It wasn’t just Jaws, either. He’d been withdrawing from you for a while, and you didn’t understand why.

Unbeknownst to you, the green-eyed hunter had kept a lacy souvenir from your room.

Now, Dean had managed to avoid you for four days. Every night since his stealthy excursion, he would lie in his bed with your stolen panties in one hand and his throbbing length in the other, feeling goddamn pathetic for sinking so low.

It was probably so low that even his memory foam mattress would remember it.

With closed eyes, he then imagined how the perky globes of your ass would look like covered in crimson lace. How you would stretch out on his bed on all fours, with your ass high in the air and wiggling in front of him. How his fingers would push the wicked material aside to push into you, taking you deep and hard while you moaned his name.

As he ruined tissue after tissue, the guilt would wash over him as soon as he was done. Call it a post-nut epiphany.

Dean knew it was wrong to think those things. He knew he only made it harder for himself to ever look you into the eyes again. Hell, he barely could do it now, even though a part of him audaciously wondered what other treasures were hiding in that drawer of yours. And more pressingly, what ultimate wealth he would find beneath your clothes. If your lingerie was gold, he’d be a creepy-ass dragon sitting on it.

So, Dean tried to avoid you as best as possible. Mostly because, well…

“God, fuck me,” you groaned exhaustively and opened the refrigerator door, leaning against it as the refreshing cold hit you from behind. On top of that, you held a big bag of frozen peas to your sweaty chest. You already wore the bare minimum – some short denims and a white tank top, your hair up in a messy bun.

“I swear underboob sweat is the worst. Just be glad you don’t have tits,” you complained. “Guys, seriously, can we invest in an AC? This heat wave is killing me! This bunker is like one giant oven…”

You watched as Dean squirmed in his seat as he ate his cereal, looking as uncomfortable as you. Surely, the boys were suffering just as badly during those sweltering temperatures, already forgoing the usual flannels and opting for plain t-shirts instead. How they were still wearing jeans was beyond you. When you first moved in, you protested against Dean’s suggestion of Naked Tuesdays, but these days, you were actually giving it a second thought.

“Well, I’m gonna drive to Kansas City today and see if I can get us an AC. Apparently, they’re all sold out, but I figured maybe with a bit of flirting and some cleavage, I can still get us one,” you explained your plan with a bright smirk and wiggled your eyebrows. “What d’you guys think, huh?”

Dean then abruptly banged his fist on the table, spilling some milk from his bowl on the surface. “For God’s sake, Y/N!”

You frowned in confusion at his unexpected outburst. “What’s up with you? Are you having a heat stroke?”

“Flirting, really?!” the hunter barked, his brow shaped into a deeply furious v.

“What’s wrong with that? Double standard much? You do it all the time to get shit,” you countered and watched his jaw clench in anger.

“I do-... not,” he remarked snappily with a fierce finger drilling into the table, clearly lacking a good argument. Sam cleared his throat in agreement with you, but that only earned him a glare. “And Jesus fucking Christ, would it hurt you to put on some goddamn clothes? You’re not even wearing a bra!”

“Did you not hear my tits rant just now? Of course I’m not! ‘Sides, those boobs are gonna get you an AC, so be a little more grateful to them,” you retorted, annoyed with his attitude. You’d think of all the people in this world, Dean Winchester would understand. (And maybe even appreciate it.) “And how can you even tell, huh?”

“‘Cause science, Y/N! You’re literally cooling your tits! What did you think was gonna happen, huh? Nipples!” he vented outrageously. “This ain’t a strip club!”

“It’s 102 degrees, Dean!” you argued, throwing your arms up. “Look, if I could, I’d even go naked, alright? It’s fucking hot!”

“Oh, for crying out loud!” Dean shook his head and stormed out of the kitchen without any further comment.

Confused, you blinked at the younger Winchester. “What’s up with him?”

But Sam only shrugged, shaking his head. “Uhm, I don’t know,” he replied, although he could take an educated guess, suspecting his brother’s feelings for you as the culprit.

“Well, alright, I’m going to Kansas City,” you decided without wasting another thought on the older Winchester’s strange behavior. “Text me if you guys need something. I can pick it up on my way home.”

Dean knew he was in deep trouble as his bow legs bolted down the bunker’s hallways. He tried so hard to keep it together, but when he saw you, half-naked and panting in front of the fridge, he quite literally lost his coolness in this goddamn heat wave.

The green-eyed hunter understood a thing or two about torture, but this was the worst of all. He’d rather have a demon repeatedly peel off his skin in hellfire than endure a day more of this fucking madness.

If the temperatures didn’t drop soon, it would be a cruel summer ahead of him.

As Dean heard the door to the garage close, he knew you’d left for your trip and exhaled a deep sigh of relief. At least he’d get a few hours of peace.

With the best intentions, he strolled to his bedroom, but as he passed your room on his way, he found the door ajar. Whatever good motives he had up until this point, went quickly out the window right then.

His hand twitched at the thought of more riches, worse than any trigger finger and competing with a California earthquake, and well, so did the dick in his jeans. It was an addiction at this point, an obsession he couldn’t resist nor get rid off. The fact that it was forbidden and wrong only made it even more appealing. The apple in the garden of Eden.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t an anonymous support group for this kind of sickness.

As unbearable shame and guilt collected in his stomach like rainwater in the gutter, his eager hands rummaged through your dresser drawer. There was purple lace and black satin, navy G-strings and white Brazilians. It was never ending, and the hunter couldn’t stop as he picked up each item and let his fantasies roam wild.

God, the things he wanted to do to you were as colorful as your rainbow full of underwear.

“Dean?!”

The green-eyed hunter froze in his place, a white lace panty still bunched up in his large palm. The hair in the back of his neck stood up in shock, a part of him refusing to turn around at the sound of your voice. He was caught red-handed, and he knew it.

“What are you doing in my room?” you prompted, suspiciously cocking an eyebrow. It looked fairly obvious what your best friend was up to, but you didn’t want to accuse him right away, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Frankly, it was quite unbelievable.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Dean replied and swallowed thickly, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he held up his hands like a criminal during an arrest, the evidence still in his grasp.

“Well, it looks like you’re snooping through my lingerie,” you pointed out bluntly.

Dean nodded, guilt-ridden and reluctant. “I can explain.”

“Good,” you said, crossing your arms over your chest. “I’m waiting…”

“Right, uhm…”

“Oh, before you scramble for an answer, you should know, though, that I’m aware a pair of red lace panties is missing, and I know the washer didn’t eat them,” you said and raised an expectant brow.

You had a feeling your pervy best friend was behind the mystery of the missing item. Now you knew for sure.

“Man, I always knew you were a kinky son of a bitch, but this is a new level, Dean,” you scolded.

Dean’s gaze dropped to the floor in shame, scratching the nape of his neck. “Look, uhm, there’s no good excuse. I know I fucked up here. I’ll sleep in a motel tonight until I find my own place. You can stay here with Sam, alright? I’ll move out and won’t bother you anymore.”

As he tried to brush past you, you blocked his exit and grabbed his arm. “So, you’re gonna leave? Just like that?”

“What other choice do I have? I don’t wanna make you more uncomfortable,” he stated without glancing at you once. He couldn’t bring himself to look into your eyes and see the disappointment and disgust there. “I know what I did was wrong.”

“Oh, so wrong,” you agreed. “I just figured you wouldn’t run away like a coward and take your punishment like a man, you know? Aren’t you at all curious what I’m wearing right now?”

That was when Dean’s juniper eyes slowly wandered to you and caught your gaze for the first time. You smirked as his breathing became heavy and his look darkened and filled with lust. It seemed like he wanted to rip your clothes off with his goddamn bare teeth like a wild animal.

“I can’t tell if you’re joking or if I’m dreaming,” he admitted, his deep voice part harsh swallow and part nervous chuckle.

“Neither,” you said, biting your bottom lip.

Carefully, you leaned closer, your hands reaching up to cup his scruffy cheeks. Noses nuzzled as your lips ghosted against his with a daring grin. You wouldn’t go further; it was up to Dean to make that final decision.

And then, as no more than a mere second ticked by on the clock, the hunter crashed his lips against yours in a kiss so scorching it made the current heat wave look like an ice age. If you thought you were hot before, now it felt like you were burning in a wildfire.

Dean roughly pushed you against the door, his kiss all teeth and tongue in an uncontrollable frenzy. His dick was hard and thick, straining against his jeans and rubbing along your thigh. Pantingly, you gasped for air and grabbed his hand, guiding it down your body and into your shorts.

“Feel that?” you asked mischievously as his fingers dug through your soaked folds and collected the arousal he caused. A wanton growl left his plush lips. “All for you, baby. You’ve been a bad boy, haven’t you?”

“Shit, yeah, so bad…” Dean rasped huskily against your throat as he worshipped his path down your body, forcing your shirt up till his wet tongue rolled over your pert and still cold nipple.

“Gonna make it up to me, huh? Show me how sorry you are?” you prompted, your fingers raking through his sandy blond and soft hair, eliciting a groan from him every time you tugged a little harder.

Teeth pinched your skin, tongue cherished your taste, and lips left your throat bruised. It was equal parts hot, sweaty, messy, naughty, dirty, and sticky as your bodies rutted against one another, looking for dire release.

With swollen and plumper than before lips, he came back up for air and found your eyes. He kissed you with heated passion once more as if he couldn’t resist to touch you over and over again. He had to restrain himself to be able to speak.

“So, uhm, you sure about this?” Dean asked between labored breaths with an insecure gleam in his green eyes. “‘Cause if we go further, I don’t think I can stop. And I don’t mean just this time but ever… If you want this to be a one time thing, you gotta tell me, sweetheart, so I can mentally prepare myself. I mean, I’ll take what I can get, you know? Not that I care either way… Well, that’s not true. I do care. A lot… But, you know, you’re you, and I’m me, so I’m not delusional. I know there’s no way you would–”

You interrupted his babbling with a kiss, causing the hunter to lose his words. You looked deeply into his eyes and offered him a small smile of comfort.

“Dean, listen to me, okay? ‘Cause this is very important,” you urged, your hands gripping his shirt tightly.

He nodded, gulping anxiously. “O-Okay.”

“You’re incredible,” you said and watched him inhale sharply at your words, blinking at you in disbelief. “Absolutely fucking bonkers incredible. You’re right – you’re you. And thank God you are, because you’re the best, funniest, smartest, kindest, and goddamn hottest man I’ve ever met. I’m tired of you not seeing that. As my boyfriend, I really need to you to see that, alright?”

As Dean pensively took in your words, his brow began to furrow. “Boyfriend?”

The corners of your mouth rose to a beam. “Yeah, boyfriend,” you confirmed. “That’s what you want, right? ‘Cause I’d really like that, too.”

“Uh, yeah, yeah… That’s what I want.” Dean nodded eagerly before another swallow followed. “I mean, among other things…”

You bit your lip, smirking. “What other things?”

“Well, uhm…”

Dean didn’t finish his sentence, his lips impatiently claiming yours instead. He pressed you hungrily back against the door, massive hands sliding down your sides till they hooked into the hem of your denim shorts and ripped them down to your ankles, leaving you only covered in teal lace. He growled shamelessly at the sight, his thick digits eagerly diving inside.

“Wanna be inside you,” he groaned into your ear, thumbing furiously at your clit. “Every hour of every day…”

“We can do that,” you agreed with a giggle, your arms locking around his neck, fingers carding through his hair in the back.

“Wanna feel your mouth around my–” The last word was muffled as he ravaged your neck, but you understood where he was going with this.

“You can do that,” you said with a smile.

“And fuck, I want you to ride my face,” he declared. That demand left you speechless, making even Dean stop for a minute and look at you. “Too far?”

You shook your head and smirked. “I can do that.”

Before Dean’s mind could fathom your words, you shoved him onto the bed, his back hitting the mattress. When you stood before him, slotted between his muscular legs, his gaze trailed up and down your body, memorizing every beautiful curve. As your fingers curled into the waistband of your panties, however, the hunter stopped you.

“Leave ‘em on, sweetheart. Don’t you dare take those off,” he told you, his hands rapaciously reaching out to you.

You played with the hem of your top and smirked, your tongue licking over your lips. “What about this? On or off?”

“Off,” he shot back faster than a bullet leaving a barrel.

“You first,” you demanded and grinned. “Remember, this is still your punishment.”

“God, I love getting punished,” Dean mumbled and slipped out of his shirt. He then swiftly shimmied out of his jeans, discarding each item carelessly around the room.

He then took a deep breath as he tugged the waistband of his boxers, his erection already fighting its way out. “Well, here goes nothing,” the hunter said and pulled his underwear down.

You tilted your head to see his hard cock from a better angle as it sprang against his stomach. Your lips parted in anticipation, wondering what he’d taste like on your tongue and how deep you’d be able to take him. You guessed there’d be a struggle ahead, considering how huge and wide he was.

“Oh, I would not call that monster nothing,” you commented with a scoff, your pussy throbbing with need. “Explains all that BDE.”

Dean blushed. It was cute to watch. “Thank you.”

Giggling, you removed your shirt and tossed it at his face, blinding him for a second. You used that momentum to slide onto the bed and straddle his torso. As his eyes finally found you again, he almost choked on his spit when he gazed up at your perfect tits above him. A primal grunt escaped his throat.

With a mesmerized sparkle in his eyes, his hands trailed up your body and cupped your breasts, massaging them roughly as your panties grew damper by the minute. He then pulled you down to his lips and kissed you breathless before he left them with a boyish smirk on his freckled face.

“Hop on, sweetheart.”

And as if his words hadn’t been enough motivation, his hands wandered to palm your ass and hauled you closer to his mouth. He was an impatient one – or maybe he’d waited years for this and was finally tired of it.

Your knees sunk into the mattress on either side of his stubborn head. His fingers dented your flesh as they grabbed onto your thighs. Yours held onto the headboard for support. You tried not to look down, because then you’d see his big lopsided and full of excitement grin.

The same one he had when you found a diner in Kentucky that advertised the biggest burger in America (it wasn’t). The same one he had when he thought he had run into a member of Metallica at a gas station outside of Phoenix (he didn’t). The same one he had when you and Sam gifted him his own beer brewing station for his last birthday (which tasted horrible, but neither you nor Sam had the heart to tell him).

And now, he had that same grin when he was about to be with you.

As your pussy dripped above him, Dean couldn’t hold back his lewd groans any longer. You didn’t even have to lower yourself; he just dragged you down onto his face all to eagerly. His fingers swiped your panties to the side, and before you could even adjust your grip on the bedpost, his tongue darted into your soaked channel as deeply as he could and sucked you goddamn dry.

With several whimpers, you clenched around his wet muscle. If you were water in the desert, he was parched and drinking to survive.

His nose was buried in your folds, rubbing deliciously against your clit as he lapped your pussy in a vicious attack that left you squirming and moaning to a pornographic degree above him. Because Dean was just that – pure porn.

Instinctively and irresistibly, you ground your cunt against him, the vibrations of his keen groans against your sensitive flesh rocking you to the edge of your climax. He ate you out and devoured you like that damn gigantic burger in Kentucky. And as you dared to blink down and watch him in action, he had the audacity to devilishly smirk up at you with the crinkles around his green eyes alone, gauging your every reaction to his touches as if you were a goddamn movie on a silver screen.

You trembled and quivered and screamed as your orgasm electrified every molecule in your body. You white-knuckled the wood in your grip, your body only held up by Dean’s strong arms because God knows your weak legs were useless now.

As wave after wave washed over you, Dean drank every drop of yours, his tongue never getting enough of your taste. The sounds that filled the room were carnal and obscene.

“Fuck, Dean,” you sighed blissfully and lifted off his face and captured his swollen and red lips in a grateful kiss, your palms finding purchase on his broad shoulders. Your drenched and sensitive cunt settled on his thighs as an egregiously large erection poked your belly and tempted you further.

Dean smirked up at you, all satisfied and confident with his achievement. “I think we have a slight problem, though.”

Your brow knitted, your heart tightening with anxiety. Had you been as disappointing as the burger, beer, and that fake Metallica band member?

But Dean only grinned teasingly at your confused face. “There’s no way I learned my lesson here.”

You snorted and sought out his lips, the kiss giving you a taste of yourself. “We’ll work on that. I might have to nickname you Jaws after this,” you joked.

“Can’t wait for you to explain that one to Sammy.” Dean snorted, chuckling. “Now, how about you hop on again, but this time a little further south, huh?” he proposed with a wiggle of his eyebrows and a suggestive twitch of his cock for emphasis.

You giggled with a few nods. “I can do that.”

Was it worth the words? 😝

For all you newcomers and as a general reminder, Dirty Drabbles are always open. I still have quite a few left, but you're welcome to send more in, and we'll add it to the collection at some point 😎🔥

PUT YOUR DIRTY THOUGHTS HERE

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#dirty drabbles #dean winchester #dean winchester x you #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester x female reader #dean winchester x y/n #dean winchester reader inser #dean winchester smut #dean winchester fluff #supernatural #supernatural reader insert #jensen ackles #jensen ackles smut #dean winchester fic #dean winchester fanfic

543 notes · View notes

bettysupremacy · 10 months

Note

please please feed into my obsession with lovesick, heart eyes, deadly smitten, will trip over nothing just by looking at you, steve. he knows he’s hot. trust me he knows. but he also doesn’t even notice the girls that will come to family video and check out anything just to talk to king steve. he can’t even care because he’s so so antsy to go home and literally be YOUR housewife. he just is like a dog in human form, a golden retriever, he wants so badly to love and please!!

This is so so true, and I think we need to spread more lovesick Steve agenda. Thank you for the request ml!!<3

A girl stands in family video, nearly ready to check out a copy of A Christmas Story. It sits on the counter, waiting for her to pick it up again, for her to hand it to Robin so she can ask Would you like a bag with that?

This is normal. That is, when it’s not June.

Robin rolls her eyes. It’s pathetic, really. She has no doubt the girl hasn’t even looked at the movie in front of her, tempted to ask “Christmas in July early?” But she won’t. Instead she’ll watch. Even if that’s a little mean.

Steve bounces on his heal. He clocked out ten minutes ago, and normally that means he would’ve been gone nine minutes ago, but you were picking him up today. And oh did he miss you.

It was heavy pounding heartache in his chest. He hadn’t seen you in a week, schedules clashing meanly, and he’s just about had enough. Enough of the turmoil that resides in his belly when he thinks of missing you.

His heart nearly bursts when you walk through the door.

He maneuvers around the counter swiftly, past Robins annoyance, past the girl with the Christmas movie, who he still hasn’t noticed. Scooping you up into a hug, he sighs into the crevice of your neck. The warm air tickles you and you giggle loudly. It’s the sweetest thing he’s heard in a week.

“Stevie, baby, it’s been a week.”

“Tell me about it.” Always with the dramatics. He gripes at the way you laugh. “You’re so mean to me.”

You gasp. “Get away you jerk.”

“Please don’t push me away, I love you.” His large hands fumble for your arms.

“Get away, I’m serious, you smell like VCR tapes.” You giggle again, palm to his cheek.

He stops, gaping. “I do not.”

Your chest aches in the most pleased way, thrilled to see him. “Yes, you do.”

Feeling sticky with love, you take a moment to look at Steve, brushing hair out of his pretty eyes. His face something funny. Pleased, but funny.

“They don’t even have a smell, dweeb” He flicks your shoulder.

“Oh, yes they do.” You nod solemnly, “and it’s all over you.”

“Shut up.” He laughs, pulling you in. His smile so close your head feels a little dizzy. “Gimme a kiss.”

“Ok, VCR boy.”

He ignores the nickname, the kiss too important to lose. You feel his grin against your lips.

Robin looks to the girl still standing hopelessly at the register. “Good choice.”

The girl deflates, walking out the door, indifferent to the movie she leaves on the counter.

Steve looks up for the first time. “What’s her problem?”

#steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #steve harrington x y/n #steve harrington x reader fluff #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington x y/n fluff #steve harrington x fem! reader #steve harrington blurb #steve harrington x fem #steve harrington x gn!reader #steve harrington x gender neutral reader #steve harrington fanfic #steve harrington fluff

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myfictionaldreams · 11 months

Note

hi! i loved pain over pleasure! especially the part where there’s sexual interactions between the three men other than just focusing on the reader. i’d like to request something slightly similar. reader gets punished by watching sirius suck remus and r can’t do anything than just sit and watch. then james walks in and instead of going to reader to save her from moony’s punishment (like he usually does) he joins the other two. it’s totally okay if you don’t go through with this. i just really loved pain over pleasure. thanks!!!!

Horny Little Devil // Poly!Marauders x Fem!Reader

A/N: Thank you so much for the request and for showing your love with Pain Over Pleasure!

Tags: 18+ readers only, smut, dom/sub, bdsm, brat reader, punishment, teasing, edging, restraints, begging, deepthroat/oral sex, cum swallowing, cum sharing, anal sex, vibrators, overstimulation, subspace, pet names, being ignored, anxiety not beta read

Words:3.3 k

my masterlist 📚 AO3 Link

Needy was the word you would use to describe your feelings today. Sirius on the other hand would describe you as a horny little devil, but could he truly blame you? Dating the three Marauders meant that you were almost always attached to one of them whether it be holding hands, in their laps in front of the fire or on your knees with their cock in your mouth. However this morning, the three of them had been rushing around to attend lessons that they’d forgotten about their poor needy girlfriend so really…could Sirius blame you for wanting to be with them?

Maybe you were being a little full-on with your neediness, instead of whispering and asking nicely to see Sirius, grabbing him by his collar and pushing him into a spare room to suck him off. Sirius only chuckled in a condescending tone, tugging on your hair to snap your attention up to him, your bottom lip sticking out with pretend sadness as he stopped your attempts to undo his belts.

“Stop being such a brat and listen to me, otherwise you aren’t going to get what you want, Darling”.

You sat back on your heels, looking up at him with wide eyes, “You haven’t been giving me what I want, that’s the issue!”

Sirius’ eyes darkened and you knew that sassing back to him maybe wasn’t the best idea so you quickly shut your mouth, a move that seemed to please him as the corner of his lip tipped up into a smirk, his shoulder-length hair falling to shadow half of his face. “I was tempted to let you carry on if you didn’t continue with that smart mouth of yours and anyway, we don’t have time, we’ll probably be late to class now because of this interruption so well done Sweetheart. Now, you’re on your last chance, any more bratty behaviour and you’ll be punished”.

You shrunk away from him, losing your confidence and beginning to stare at the floor, realising your mistake and not wishing to be punished, but you just wanted to feel them. Sirius let go of your hair and tapped a finger under your chin, tilting your face back up so you were looking at him once more, his sleek eyebrow raised in question, “Do you understand me?”

“Yes, sir. I’m sorry Sirius”.

Sirius nodded, holding a hand out which you took and he helped you to stand, brushing the dust from your knees and moved back towards the door but he held you back for one second with a gentle hand on your arm. You looked up at him with a confused expression but soon sighed as he leaned down to peck your lips, lingering for a second before pulling back. “Sorry it’s been such a rush this morning, I promise later we’ll look after you. Just listen to us, and we can all get what we want, ok?”

You agreed with a grin, capturing his lips one more time before he held the door open for you.

Your self-restraint lasted for a mind-blowing 25 minutes. This one really wasn’t your fault though as Remus had decided it was a good idea to rest his strong hand against your thigh, under your skirt, his hot palm directly against your skin. The tallest marauder knew exactly what the touch would do and didn’t remove it even as you turned into a dribbling mess, hugging his arm closer to your body and refusing to do the work because you were so distracted.

“My love, we have an exam at the end of the week, you need to take notes”, Remus whispered against the top of your head, but you ignored him, holding him closer, trying to push his hand higher up your thigh. However, he instead squeezed the muscle, “I know you’re needy right now but need to do your work”, Remus continued to encourage.

“Is someone being a brat again?” Sirius asked from behind as he leaned over his desk towards you and Remus.

Remus kept his voice low as he asked, “Again? She’s been a brat already today?”

“Yeah, we had a little run-in, in the spare classroom on the way here, didn’t we Sweetheart?” Sirius whispered in response. You tried not to whine as your grip relaxed, realising that you’d been caught and there was one thing that Remus and Sirius did not forget was that they always kept to their word.

“Mr Black, is there a problem over there?”, Professor McGonagall’s voice interrupted the quiet conversation.

“No Professor”, Sirius replied cooly, sitting back in his chair.

Remus continued writing for a couple of seconds before saying under his breath, “We’ll talk about this later”.

Only when later came, there was no talking involved. After watching James practice quidditch for an hour or so, Sirius suggested to you and Remus about going to the shrieking shack for some alone time whilst James finished, which you were more than happy to agree to, practically dragging both men by their hands in the direction of the decrepit building.

However, once there, you were stripped of your clothes and tied to the head of the bed with your wrists attached to the posts with both men’s ties and your legs were spread, exposing your soaked pussy.

“Do you remember our earlier conversation?”, Sirius asked, stroking a teasing hand up your inner thigh, already seeing the evidence of arousal with how wet you were.

“Ye-Yes”, you admitted, breathing quickly with increasing anxiety.

“So you know why we are doing this?”, he continued, making sure you had clarification as to why you were being tied up. They always made sure to do this, even when you were misbehaving the most to get to this point, you had to understand why the punishment was taking place and that your safewords were always there to use if needed. It all added to the overall experience and even though there was nothing you wanted more than to be touched and caressed by any of your boyfriends, you trusted them above anyone else and would continue to go through the punishment for this reason.

So after you’d explained why this was happening and reiterated at this could stop at any moment if you wished.

Sirius seemed happy with your answers and glanced over his shoulder at Remus who was sitting in a chair next to the bed, his legs spread wide and a noticeable bulge in his trousers. The man smiled, his scars stretching with the movement as he reached into his pocket and pulled out one of your favourite toys: your rose gold bullet vibrator, a present from James for Valentine's Day. Waving his wand, the vibrator magically floated through the air, only stopping mid-air when the cool metal touched your clit.

Sirius then placed your panties into your mouth to stop you from begging and climbed off of the bed and you had to watch as he approached Remus, his long hair framing his face as he leant down to make out of the other man. From this angle, you could only see the back of Sirius as he leaned over, but you could hear it all, the noises of their lips, the gasps and moans.

Your wrists stung slightly as you tested the hold, tugging on the ties that held you, hoping that maybe one of them would be loosened enough that you could pull free but they only tightened and you stopped your wasted efforts. Collapsing back against the headboard, you tried to calm yourself down but your body felt like it was on fire, sweat already coating it, eyes burning as you didn’t want to blink and miss a single moment of the teasing that was happening.

Even though there was nothing more you wanted at that moment than to be untied and join in with Sirius and Remus, the sight of them touching, and pleasuring one another was something you would store at the back of your mind for days you wanted to make yourself feel better. It was so erotic and hot that your pussy was twitching and clenching around nothing, juices dripping down your perineum, with the destination to soak the sheets.

Sirius dropped to his knees, settling in comfortably before swiftly undoing Remus’ belt, button and zipper and opening the material up, giving him room to reach into the hole of his checkered underwear and expose his throbbing member. As Sirius was on his knees, you were able to see Remus’ impressive cock, standing thick and proud, veins pulsing and ready to be touched.

You must have audibly made a noise as Remus suddenly looked up at you, a look of surprise on his face as he had momentarily forgotten that you were even in the room but then he rolled his wand in between his fingers and smirked. Sirius raised further on his knees, one hand resting against Remus’ thigh and the other holding the base of his cock and finally gave one solid lick up the entire length.

The moment Sirius’ wet tongue touched Remus’ cock, the wand in his hand flicked slightly, magically turning on the vibrator that still floated against your bundle of nerves. You groaned at the sensation, the buzz light and the pressure weren’t enough to drive you crazy just yet but you knew that he was just warming you up, even though you were already thoroughly aroused.

Remus kept his wand pointed towards you, controlling the vibrator, but his other hand was holding back Sirius’ hair, watching as he was hungrily sucking off. It was one thing Sirius prided himself in was the lack of gag reflex he had, being able to take the entire length of Remus, something you could never do and envied the Gryffindor for.

You tried to beg around your panties but all that could be heard was muffled cries, the material making your mouth incredibly dry so you tried to look sadly at Remus, your eyes sad and lower lip trembling as your hips rolled to try and push harder against the floating metal object, wishing to feel more.

Sirius’s head bobbed up and down quickly, his cheeks sucking and causing slurping noises that felt so good to Remus, his shaft throbbing with the movements. “Feel so good when you do that Padfoot, just like that”, Remus encouraged, letting his eyes drop close. “Do you think we should let our little pup join us?” Remus asked, still lost in the pleasure.

Sirius pulled off with an audible pop, a grin spreading across his face - not that you could see from your position - and responded with a simple: “Nope”, before swallowing Remus’ cock again.

Remus bite his lip at the sensation and opened his eyes as he flicked his wand again, the vibrations increasing tenfold, completely overwhelming your entire pussy, feeling them deep in your abdomen causing you to scream out in euphoria. Your body jolted at the pleasure, hips bucking wildly, pussy clenching, wishing it was full with fingers or a cock. Not that you truly were fussy at that moment as your orgasm built swiftly, feeling like a cord tightening in your abdomen, the walls of your cunt squeezing together, you were so close, still watching Sirius pleasure Remus, who had now opened his eyes and was watching you closely, assessing when you were just…about…to … cum.

And then he magiced the vibrator away from your body and your peaked fluttered away to nothingness, and now it truly dawned on you what sort of punishment they were giving you: edging. This was one of your least favourite punishments, especially added to the fact that you had to watch your boyfriends find their own pleasures.

Your thighs were trembling as you cried out, head dropping against your shoulder as you tried to regain some composure but then the vibrator was back on the low setting and pressing against your clit.

Your mewling begs were cut off however as James walked in, still wearing his quidditch uniform and a small sly smile on his face as he took in the sight of you tied to the bed, being pleasured by the sex toy and Remus being blown by Sirius on a chair.

“I could hear her from outside”, he admitted towards Remus before heading towards the bed, sitting at the edge near you. “Poor baby, you look so desperate, do you want some help?”, he cooed, stroking a hand up your inner thighs.

You nodded your head desperately, moaning wishing you could say yes yes yes. James thankfully was usually the one to give in to your begging, always undoing your restraints first, or helping you find your satisfaction so seeing him here now, you had no doubts that he would be doing the same for you now, after all, he hadn’t really seen you being a brat today.

All hope was lost however as he leaned forward, kissed your cheek and walked over to his boyfriends, dropping to his knees beside Sirius who had sifted to the side, giving him some room, and he began to pleasure Remus as well.

You groaned in frustration, realising you were very much stuck there and had to watch a sight you wanted to desperate be a part of.

Sirius and James licked up the length of Remus’ cock, both men then making out around the tip and you don’t know who groaned louder, you or Remus. Then whilst one man swallowed the thick length, the other would be sucking on the balls, working together to bring Remus to his own orgasm.

All the whilst, Remus kept up his torturous game of turning up the vibration level and just as you were about to cum, taking all the pleasure away.

3 times he had done this now, your juices were leaking onto the sheets below, your entire body trembling as you begged in your mind to please let you cum but of course, they didn’t let you. Your cunt was beginning to become puffy with stimulation and your throbbing clit was aching from the toy and you’d physically jolt and pull away as it always came back to hover against you. You were exhausted, your body drained of energy, your head feeling fuzzy and floaty as your needs drifted your thoughts into a space-like consciousness.

But you still continued to watch your boyfriends, hoping that the small act would mean your punishment would be over quicker because you were continuing to be good but it only made it harder to stay calm. You felt like you were just in the constant heightened state of being wanting to cum, hardly having much time to rest.

Remus suddenly shifted, his hips thrusting up harshly into the back of James’ mouth, his hand releasing its hold on Sirius’ hair to instead hold onto the back of James, keeping his head there, “Fuck Prongs, that’s it, stay right there”, he grunted, his eyes clenching closed as he came. James held still, taking the load to the back of his mouth and only pulling back when Remus sighed, his hand relaxing and letting go of the back of his head. “Did you swallow?” Remus asked with half-lidded eyes.

You couldn’t see but you knew that James had opened his mouth and revealed that he hadn’t swallowed because the next moment he was leaning over and heavily kissing Sirius, his cum coated tongue swiping against the other mans so they both had to swallow.

Remus groaned at the sight, tucking his half-soft, wet cock back into his trousers, trying to also catch his breath before glancing over the men towards you and you couldn’t hold back the sob anymore, not wishing to ruin the moment but seeing his attention had turned to you, it was almost too much.

You’d been edged against during his orgasmic scene, you were starting to become sore with belly aches with how much you’d been clenching your cunt and wanting to feel that high more than anything in the world.

Standing from his chair and rolling his shoulders, Remus stepped between his two boyfriends and finally came out to you, shimming behind your body so your back was against his chest. Your head lolled back against his shoulder as he nuzzled into your neck, reaching around your front so that he could pull out your panties from your mouth, the cool air drying your mouth further as you didn’t have the energy to close it.

“You’ve done so well sweetheart, do you want to cum? I’m gonna need you to tell me”, Remus whispered against the skin of your cheek, hands idly stroking circles against your stomach as he spooned around your body.

You were nodding tiredly before even talking, half aware that deep moans were coming from the other end of the bed from James being bent over and fucked by Sirius. “Please can I cum, Remus?” you asked, voice croaky from exhaustion and dryness.

“What do you think Padfoot?” Remus asked, looking up at Sirius who was slowing his pace, his hips rolling in and out, teasing James who was touching himself from his bent-over position.

Sirius blew a piece of hair from his face as he looked over at you, feeling somewhat sorry that you’d been edged for so long, “yeah go on then, seeing as she’s been such a good girl”.

You wanted to thank him profusely for his beautiful words but couldn’t muster up the energy to say them, instead completely allowing your body to relax back into Remus. Your boyfriend's long fingers delved over your mound, groaning at how wet and used you were.

“You’ve done so well for us pup, I’m not going to stop ok, you can cum for us”, Remus reassured as he pressed two fingers against your overstimulated clit, rolling it in his fingers, back and forth, the pressure firm and steady. With his other hand, he waved his wand again and all of your restraints untied so you were now fully collapsed against him, eyes closed, mouth open with a string of curses and whimpers escaping.

It didn’t take you long at all, still remaining at that heightened-edged sensation, Remus held you close as you finally came, body spasming as you were so overwhelmed with how to react and control yourself. “That’s it, let go for us, I’ve got you”, Remus continued to encourage and you were thankful for this, letting his voice ground you to the moment.

It felt so good to feel your cunt squeezing in quick bursts, juices coating the tops of your trembling thighs, and your entire body felt like it was burning as your nerves tried to comprehend the stimulation. Finally, as your orgasm began to subside, Remus’ fingers slowed to a stop and you fully collapsed into him, half away that he was moving your body so you were cuddled into his side, legs over his lap and head laying against his chest.

You were just about ready to have a little nap when you heard James gasping as Sirius pounded into him and you forced yourself to stay awake a little bit longer so you could watch both men fuck.

Remus could feel you were still awake as he kissed the top of your head, “pretty aren’t they”, he mumbled against you.

“Mmmm, so so pretty”, you agreed as you watched them both from their standing position, giving Sirius the better position to fuck James and reach around his body to wank his cock off as well, after a few more grunts, James was cumming hard, his seed spurting out in thick gloops across the bed.

Sirius pushed the quidditch player over the bed once more, the man now lying in his own cum and began mercilessly fucking his arse, chasing his own high, James moaned through the entire interaction before Sirius’ hips stilled with a hard yell and slap to James’ ass cheek.

Finally, after watching all three men reach their highs during that afternoon, you felt settled enough to fall asleep in Remus’ arms, knowing that when you woke up, you might be feeling a little bit subspacey but that was a problem for another time.

#poly!marauders #the marauders #james potter smut #sirius black smut #remus lupin smut #sirius black x reader #james potter x reader #remus lupin x reader #marauders x reader #mine*#hp smut #hp oneshot

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take-everything-you-can · 2 months

Note

Thinking about dad!Eddie getting emotional and thanking you for giving him the little family he's always wanted. Ok bye! @munson-blurbs 💚

@munson-blurbs idk how you get me in the feels every time 💞

Eddie comes home from the longest day at work. He's incredibly tired basically walking sleep.

Wen he opens the door to your little home, the one you begged him to make an offer on. The one on Maple Street, with the big windows in the kitchen.

When he opens the door he finds you laying on the couch with your daughter curled up by your side. Your son a six month old chunk, held to your chest.

Well he can't help but tear up as the thing he's always wanted sits right in front of him, within his reach.

His mother always told him he woud find a girl and settle down, but at six who's listening. At eleven girls are gross, and at sixteen that felt impossible. Twenty two years on this earth it took him to find you, for you to be in his orbit.

You shuffle in your sleep and he walks over just as your eyes start to flutter open, he bends down and places a kiss to your forehead. He sits on the sliver of couch left.

"hi baby, how was work." Eddie smiles and bites on his lip to avoid the disaster that was today.

" It was just another long one, nothing went right and all the parts we ordered for a car were for the wrong year. How was yours my love?"

You take your hand not wrapped around your baby boy and caress Eddie's cheek. " I'm sorry you had such a a bad day eds. Mine was just as bad. Your daughter decided that the walls were paper and your son ran a bit of a fever throughout the day. "

Eddie just smiles at you. A soft tempting thing. Even with the way things had been today, he still would go through all of it for the rest of his life, every day, if it meant he could come home and hear about how equally bad your day was as well.

He picks up your daughter and carries her to her room. You follow placing your son in his crib. You both stood by the door as you were leaving, one last look to make sure all monsters were clear from under the bed, and that all snores were light and soft.

Eddie wraps you up in his arms from behind, humming in satisfaction.

" Thank you for giving me everything I could have ever wanted." He kissed the side of your head as you melt in his embrace.

" I would go to the ends of the earth for you Eddie Munson."

"Ditto Mrs. Munson."

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x fem reader #dad eddie munson #dilf eddie munson #requested #mae blurbs #eddie stranger things #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson fluff #fuck me up munson

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fizzydrink698 · 1 year

Text

conflict, conceal, confess | minho

kinktober day 31: thigh-riding

pairing: lee minho x reader

word count: 18.1k (💀)

genre: college au, enemies to lovers, (modern!consort au)

warnings: sexual content (thigh-riding, oral sex, fingering, handjob, marking, a whole lot of smut honestly, like 6k words of it), swearing, an ungodly amount of academia

summary:

“Why don’t we call a truce?”

Minho blinked, caught off-guard. “Truce?”

“Yeah. No more arguments…” you trailed off, the words already sounding hollow and you were the one saying them. “OK, maybe some academic debate. But nothing personal.”

“Nothing petty,” Minho added, giving you a pointed look.

It took an impressive amount of willpower to force your smile to stay on your face. “Exactly. We somehow managed it as kids. How hard could it be to do it again?”

“Your brother is such an asshole.”

You wondered how many of your conversations with Felix had started with those exact words. In the years since childhood, there had probably been countless variations of this very situation: you collapsing into a seat near Felix, ready to unleash after biting your tongue for however many hours beforehand.

His reaction was second nature at this point. Without even glancing towards you, Felix paused in the middle of rolling out what looked to be shortbread dough and turned to switch on the coffeemaker. “What is it this time?”

“Do you remember how many new people signed up to debate at the start of the year? Had to be at least twenty, right? Maybe thirty?”

“At least thirty,” Felix confirmed. “I gave out blondies to every person that signed up. The entire pan was gone in like an hour.”

Yes, you remembered that day. Specifically, you remembered Felix holding up the empty pan with a big smile on his face and proudly declaring how many people had shown interest in joining. And you’d had to figure out how to politely break it to him that the hordes of first-year students walking back and forth in front of his table were eyeing a little more than just his baked goods.

Sweet boy. Sweet, innocent, oblivious boy.

“Guess how many are left,” you challenged him, eager to prove a point.

Felix frowned, thinking it over. “There were still about fifteen when I was last there. So, ten?”

“Six,” you exclaimed, balling your hand into a fist and planting it onto the tabletop for dramatic effect. “And Minho made one of them cry today.”

In just a few years, you and Minho had transformed your university’s debate team into one of the most successful in the country. You’d won awards, you’d attended international competitions, you’d gained notice from several notable figures in academia. Membership of the debate team had gone from a minor footnote you’d discard in an application to a badge of prestige, of recognised talent.

Minho’s standards were high, shockingly so, but he got results. As a second-in-command in all but name, it was usually up to you to run damage control, to nudge members towards persevering instead of walking out the door. The good cop to his bad cop, the carrot to his stick. You’d be tempted to call it exhausting, were it not for the undeniable rush of satisfaction whenever you succeeded in building up a member where Minho failed.

Lately, however, your efforts were starting to fall short. In just eight weeks, over twenty recruits had quit before team selections had even finished.

“Oh, jeez,” Felix muttered. Before he could say anything more, the coffeemaker chirped behind him, and he wasted no time pouring you the biggest cup he had lying around.

You motioned it over with greedy little grabby-hands, accepting it with a smile.

Felix returned to his shortbread dough and picked up a star-shaped cookie cutter. “Why did they cry?”

You made a vaguely displeased noise through a mouthful of coffee, only managing to word a response when you set the mug down. “I don’t even know. This week’s debate was on the ethics of nuclear power, and I could tell she took pretty much all her talking points from Wikipedia. I assume it was about that. Minho probably got all Minho about it and tore her to shreds.”

Felix paused. You wondered if it was just because he was concentrating on his cookies, until you realised he was hesitating. “…I don’t know. I know Minho takes this stuff seriously, but he’s not the kind of guy to make some poor kid cry over debating.”

“Why not?“ You asked, and you can’t stop the bitterness creeping out into your voice. “It’s nothing he hasn’t done before.”

“Oh…” Felix said, eyes widening in realisation. He lifted his head up to look at you, sympathetic. “Shit, yeah. I’m sorry.”

For the most part, you’d gotten over your experience in high school debate club, but the memories still stung a little.

You’d been so eager, signing up the very second you were eligible, talking Felix’s ear off about how excited you were, how much you were looking forward to it. You’d known that Felix’s older brother - a year ahead of you - was somewhat of a big deal in the club, and you’d maybe imagined him taking you under his wing. Looking out for you, encouraging you with gentle feedback and a warm smile.

You’d gone into your first debate, attempted to expand upon the few points you’d known about the topic, and shyly waited for Minho’s counterarguments.

He had stepped up to the microphone, levelled you with a blank stare, and eviscerated every single argument you’d made. Pointed out every logical fallacy, every gap in your research, every misspoken or poorly worded statement, everything. He’d cut you right to the bone, with zero mercy.

You spent the rest of the club meeting holding back tears, ran all the way to Felix’s house as soon as it was over, sobbing your eyes out – and actually, maybe that was the first of many “your brother is an asshole” exchanges.

Huh. Funny how things come full circle like that.

When Minho returned home about a half-hour after you, you’d stormed into his room and demanded to know why he would treat you so badly. Did he want to drive you away from the club? Did he secretly hate you this whole time?

You’d never forget his response. The shrug he gave you, the arch of one eyebrow as he took in the sight of you, burning with rage, fists clenched by your side. The fucking sigh.

I just thought you’d do better than that.

What a fucking thing to say to a fourteen-year-old. Especially one that looked up to him the way you did.

And, deep-down, there was a certain sting that accompanied his words. Something you could never bring yourself to admit out loud, not even to Felix. An extra flash of pain, because back then you’d…

Whatever. It was ancient history.

You had almost quit on the spot. Instead, you dove headfirst into researching the next week’s topic, determined to beat him, paranoid about every little mistake he might pick at.

And that…

Well, that was your life for the next nine years. Even that one blissful year when Minho had graduated, the year you’d taken over as head of debate club, the year you’d gotten your team all the way to nationals - he still didn’t leave you in peace.

He’d turned up to that final competition, gaze intense, face neutral. You’d spotted him in the audience, unable to tear your eyes away, watching every little twitch of his jaw, every tiny shift in expression, and knew he was picking apart your arguments. Waiting for you to trip up and fail in front of everyone.

It felt like a glorious ‘fuck you’ when your team won that year. You’d held that trophy, looked right into Minho’s eyes, and wanted to scream ‘I fucking told you so’ right in his smug face.

Ugh. Asshole.

“It’s all in the past,” you said, forcing yourself to shrug it off.

Taking another swig of coffee, you reached over and poked Felix’s shoulder, grinning.

“And besides…Minho isn’t the one coming with me to the U.N. next month.”

“Next month,” Felix repeated, slightly in awe, matching your excitement and then some. “Holy shit, it’s so soon.”

It was. In just a few weeks’ time, you’d be standing in front of a U.N. committee giving a speech on commitment to environmental preservation with your best friend by your side. You’d worked for this for months, years even. And you’d be doing it together.

“I’m afraid I have bad news about the U.N. speech.”

You sat there, horrified, as your supervisor – Dr. Koning – shuffled the papers on his desk with a grave expression. “What? What happened? Don’t tell me it’s cancelled.”

“It’s not cancelled,” Dr. Koning said, before pausing. “…But it has been postponed. Certain recent global events have pushed it further down the agenda. The speech will happen next January.”

“January?” You repeated, and horror quickly dawned on you. “No, wait. Felix can’t do January. He’s studying abroad next semester. There has to be some other…”

“I’m afraid there’s not. I’ve tried to speak to the few contacts I have, but changing the agenda of the United Nations is…well, a little beyond our capabilities, I’m sure you can understand.”

“But this is just as much Felix’s speech as it is mine. It’s on environmental preservation, he’s the one that’s specialising in environmentalism, he can’t just get dropped like…what if he flew back for the U.N. speech? That’s doable, right?”

“Even if he could, he would still be missing the weeks of preparation leading up to the speech,” Dr. Koning reminded you, sounding genuinely apologetic. “Unless he withdraws from his study-abroad program, I’m afraid we have to give his spot to someone else.”

You felt like you’d just been punched, right in the gut. Felix couldn’t withdraw from the program. It was one of the main reasons he’d chosen this university in the first place. He’d spent months competing for the limited spaces at the best partner university, he’d e-mailed the faculty there ahead of time to begin networking, he’d based his entire career path on the connections he could make there.

Even the fucking United Nations wasn’t worth the damage his future plans would take if he dropped out of studying abroad.

“…Who’s taking his spot?” You asked, quiet, defeated.

Dr. Koning looked down at the papers, and adjusted his glasses. “Well, there are a few candidates in mind. But at such short notice, there’s really only one feasible choice. One of my colleague’s PhD students, you might know him. Lee Minho?”

…No.

No.

Absolutely fucking not.

You choked on the sudden anger bursting from your chest, trying your best to push it down before you started cussing out Lee Minho right in front of your professor. Finally, you were able to respond through gritted teeth. “Yes, I know him. We don’t…really get on.”

Dr. Koning frowned, pushing his glasses higher up the bridge of his nose. “I’m sorry to hear that. Are there any incidents I should be aware of?”

“No, nothing like that,” you said. “Just…it’s been a thing since we were kids. We don’t like each other.”

“Well, we can look for others…” he said, before trailing off. Frowning, he leaned forward slightly, granting himself an air of conspiracy, like he was letting you in on a secret. “But, honestly…if this is something you feel comfortable setting aside, just temporarily, you should know that Minho really is the best candidate. By quite a wide margin.”

Of fucking course he was.

You let out a deep breath, closing your eyes and fighting the urge to start massaging your temples.

“…Maybe,” you relented, even if it took every ounce of willpower you had. “I’ll talk to him.”

“Good to hear,” Dr. Koning said, smiling. “I really do hope the two of you can work together on this. Both of you have shown astounding potential. I look forward to seeing what you come up with.”

“…Mm-hm. Me too.”

It was a cold, crisp Monday morning, and you found yourself stood on the steps of the lecture halls. The expression on your face was enough for the dawdling first-years around you to give you a wide berth, allowing you to scroll through your e-mails in peace.

Scroll through your e-mails, and wait.

For him.

Felix had mentioned that Minho was sitting in on a talk from a visiting financial expert on the state of global economics, and you figured now was as good a time as any to confront him about the speech.

…And by ‘confront’, you meant ‘patiently and politely open channels of communication’. Of course.

Fuck, it was freezing.

You shivered, pulling your scarf just a little tighter around your neck, and exited out of your e-mails to shoot a text to Felix.

You

Who in their right mind voluntarily sits in on an economics lecture at eight o’clock on a Monday morning?

Lixie

…

i mean

…literally you last week

You

OK first of all

That was a fucking Guillaume Van Bebber seminar

The man has a Nobel prize

Second of all

That wasn’t a Monday

Third

Shut up

Lixie

ok no cookies for you

You

Wait no, what??

I take it back.

Take it all back.

You’re my bestest friend in the whole world.

Bestest and smartest.

Waittt

You were so distracted texting Felix, you didn’t notice the doors to the lecture halls opening, and the slow stream of students beginning to file out.

You did, however, notice a familiar voice.

Your head snapped up to see Minho at the top of the steps, talking with who looked to be the guest lecturer. The two were standing still, rather than walking along with the rest of the students, positioned just out of the way so they could continue whatever conversation they were having without interruption.

Cool, even more waiting.

You shifted your weight, shoving your hands into the pockets of your coat to keep warm, and watched as Minho continued to speak – and, unbelievably, managed to make this lecturer laugh.

You blinked.

What the fuck? Minho didn’t make people laugh. He made them miserable, yes, but never laugh.

And then, suddenly, as if he could sense your insults, Minho looked over and locked eyes with you. His eyebrows raised slightly, probably in surprise at seeing you on campus so early in the morning. You made sure to maintain eye contact – an old habit with Minho, by this point. You hated being the first to look away, it always felt like weakness.

He turned away, saying something to the lecturer with a slight incline of his head.

The lecturer blinked, before nodding. You watched as, with a warm smile, the lecturer extended what looked to be a business card to Minho.

Minho accepted it, the two exchanged one final handshake, before Minho turned on his heel and descended the steps.

Towards you.

It was a little unfair, you wanted to grumble, that Minho always looked so put-together, no matter the time of day. He was wearing a black turtleneck sweater, perfectly suited for the chilly October morning air, under a tailored beige overcoat. It looked designer, the plaid pattern on its lining looking vaguely familiar, but that was standard for Minho’s wardrobe. You’d known since you were a little kid that Felix’s family had money.

Like, fuck-you money.

You forced your eyes up to his face before they travelled any further downwards, but you knew from a glance that Minho was wearing some form of tight black jeans. They were a staple of his wardrobe, and you hated them. You hated any and every reminder of Minho’s…

Well, Minho’s fucking tree trunk thighs.

Which you also hated.

With a passion.

He did dance as a kid. And some kind of equestrian thing in his teenage years – because, again, fuck-you money – which all contributed to…

You know what?

Didn’t matter.

Because you hated them. They weren’t worth mentioning.

“We need to talk about the U.N. speech,” you said, as soon as he got close enough, cutting straight to the chase.

“OK,” Minho nodded, approaching closer. You paused, confused, as he showed no sign of slowing. He drew closer and closer, and something tightened in your chest, as he–

He brushed past you, shoulder nearly bumping yours, continuing onwards past you.

You stilled, rooted to the spot for a moment, blinking at the empty air where he had just been standing.

Shock quickly morphed into incredulous anger, and you turned sharply to storm after him, blown away by his rudeness. “Hey, where – what the fuck?”

Minho paused, turning to face you, halting so suddenly that you almost bumped right into him. You stumbled back a step or two, before righting yourself, as Minho asked. “…Wait, did you mean now?”

The way he said it, confused, as if you were the strange one for not specifying the obvious.

“No, I was thinking in three weeks. But let me just check my calendar first,” you retorted, deadpan. “Yes, now. Why else would I be here?”

“For classes,” Minho pointed out, gesturing to the lecture building he’d just exited.

You opened your mouth instinctively, before pausing.

Because the honest answer, that you were here because you’d been waiting for him, now sounded…

“…Look, are you free to talk about the speech or not?” You asked, folding your arms over your chest.

Minho stared at you for a moment, before giving you a shrug. “I’ve got about an hour before my next class.”

“Good.”

“I usually get coffee around this time, while it’s quiet.”

“…OK? Good for you?” You said, frowning slightly.

Minho kept staring, looking…strangely expectant.

What, he wanted a pat on the back for having coffee in the morning?

Finally, with a sharp exhale that could almost be mistaken as an exasperated sigh, Minho turned away and set off walking again.

Rude. You were literally just having a conversation? Now, he just expected you to follow him?

Ugh.

Reluctantly, you did just that, having to quicken your pace to match Minho’s stride with those…fucking gargantuan legs of his.

Legs that didn’t matter. Because you didn’t notice them. At all.

To your surprise, Minho didn’t head for Muffin House, the main coffee shop on campus. That was your go-to place for caffeine – it was cheap, they had a bunch of muffins in different flavours, and they had an irresponsibly large number of discounts on extra espresso shots for students.

Instead, you had to follow Minho down a little side street nestled between two of the towering science blocks, cut across a near-deserted car park, and finally took a right towards a quiet little pocket of buildings on the edge of campus.

You would have walked right past the coffee shop entirely, were it not for Minho suddenly ducking through the doorway of a non-descript stone building. You paused, and it was only after looking up and studying the front face of the building that you noticed the sign for Kwon’s Koffee.

Inside, it looked indistinguishable from other coffee shops on campus – except it was far less crowded, with only a few tables taken up by exclusively postgraduate students.

This was definitely one of those little insider-knowledge haunts for PhD students, like Minho. And the idea almost made you want to hate it on principle.

You joined the queue behind Minho, gaze wandering toward the board of coffee specials.

…Fuck, OK, they did look pretty good.

Still, the principle of the matter remained.

“You realise Muffin House was so much closer, right?” You asked, glancing at Minho.

Minho made a face. “Yeah, but their coffee is shitty.”

“No, it’s not!”

“It’s always bitter.”

“Yeah, because it’s made to go with the super-sweet muffins,” you said, slowing your words as if trying to explain the concept of taste to a toddler. “They balance each other out.”

“Which means if you don’t get muffins, you’re shit out of luck,” Minho pointed out, and glanced over his shoulder at you. “And I never get them.”

You stared at him, genuinely affronted by this statement. Yet another thing to add to the colossal-sized list of reasons to dislike Minho. “What? Why? How?”

He shrugged. “I don’t have much of a sweet tooth.”

“How are you and Felix even related?”

“It’s because of Felix,” Minho argued, and you had to admit, your interest was piqued. “Who do you think was the test subject for all his recipes?”

“What, were they bad?” You asked, intrigued.

Minho smiled ruefully. “Some were. But the most dangerous ones were the great ones. There’s only so many whole pans of brownies you can inhale before your body just rejects sugar on sight.”

Huh.

You forgot, sometimes, how close Minho and Felix were. It didn’t entirely fit in with your general doctrine of ‘Minho = The Worst’ so it was often banished to the back of your mind.

You supposed even the absolute dregs of humanity usually had at least one redeeming quality.

…Wait, this was coming dangerously close to an actual conversation with Minho.

“I think you’re just a coffee snob,” you dismissed with a shrug.

Minho rolled his eyes, and that brief façade of reasonable humanity vanished. “If Muffin House figured out how to brew coffee without burning it to shit, I’d drink it. But they haven’t yet, so…”

You opened your mouth, already raring to start an argument, but it was at that moment that the person in front of Minho in the queue finished ordering. Minho turned away from you, and walked up to the counter.

You followed closely behind, and it was only when your attention shifted from Minho to the person behind the counter that your eyes lit up.

“Seungmin?”

Seungmin blinked, leaning to the side just a little to look over Minho’s shoulder at you, surprised. “Oh, hey! Long time no see.”

Seungmin had been a stalwart member of your debate team for the first few years of undergrad, until he landed a job as research assistant for one of the most respected professors on campus. You had a lot of good feeling towards him, not least because he – along with Felix – often acted as the mediator between you and Minho.

He must have remembered that role too, as his gaze soon shifted back and forth between you and Minho, and his brow furrowed slightly. “Wait, are you two getting coffee? Like, together?”

You saw Minho bristle out of the corner of your eye, and you fought back a scoff. Did he really find it so insulting to be seen in public with you? “Yes, we are.”

Seungmin’s eyes flickered between the two of you again. “…Voluntarily?”

Minho answered this time, seemingly through gritted teeth. “Apparently.”

“Huh,” Seungmin said, mostly to himself. “Interesting.”

“Can we order now?” Minho asked, impatiently.

Seungmin shrugged, ignoring Minho’s rudeness, and set about taking your orders.

(Of course, Minho took his coffee black. Pretentious motherfucker probably had a whole thing about palate and bean aroma or whatever. You threw in a muffin with your order, to spite Minho more than anything else.)

It was only at the end, when it came to payment, that Seungmin looked up again at the two of you. “Are you guys paying separately, or…?”

That was kind of a dumb question.

“Separately,” you said, pointing out the obvious.

“Very separately,” Minho echoed, giving Seungmin a very pointed look.

Impressively, Minho’s glare did little to change Seungmin’s expression. In fact, Seungmin only smiled a little wider, calmly reverting back to his standard customer service script. “…OK. Cash or card?”

After payment, it only took a few minutes of waiting for your coffee before you found yourself sat at a table in the corner of the coffee shop, facing directly across from Minho.

The two of you sat there in silence, coffee in front of you.

How did you…how did you even start a conversation with Minho that wasn’t an argument? Usually, you relied on him to say something incorrect and pounce on it.

Now? You had to figure out how to be…nice. Civil. All because of this dumb speech.

You watched Minho shrug off his coat, turning in his seat to drape the coat over the back of his chair. The black turtleneck he was wearing underneath was surprisingly form-fitting, and when he turned back around to face you and pick up his mug, your eyes dropped down to your own cup before you gave into the urge to scowl openly.

Sometimes, you wondered if it would be harder to hate Minho if he were less attractive.

It was a thought you crushed down the second it came into your head, but you couldn’t entirely deny it. There had been moments, unspeakable moments, when you started dating someone, that your brain betrayed you and compared them to Minho. It was like he had to just…infect every part of your life. He had to ruin everything.

You swallowed, curling your fingers around the handle of your mug, tapping the edge of it with your thumb. “…So, the speech.”

“The speech.”

“I assume Koning already talked to you about it?”

“Yes.”

“…And?” You said, resisting the urge to scream. This was like pulling teeth. “Your thoughts?”

Minho sat back in his chair, eyeing you closely. “Why the U.N.?”

Easy question. So easy, you’d almost call it moronic. “It’s the U.N. It’s literally where I want my career to take me.”

“You want to work at the U.N.?” Minho asked, and you could almost mistake his tone for interest.

“Yes,” you said, confidently, half-prepared to defend yourself in case Minho decided to find your ambition laughable. Screw him. “The Human Rights Council, preferably, but I wouldn’t say no to a job in the General Assembly.”

“Who would?” Minho remarked, deadpan.

“Ergo, a speech there. It wasn’t easy, but we managed it,” you said, not even pretending to be humble.

“…It’s impressive, honestly. What you’ve achieved.”

“What me and Felix achieved,” you corrected him automatically, but honestly, you were a little thrown. That sounded…dangerously close to a compliment. From Minho.

“Koning said it was your idea,” Minho said. “You came up with the proposal, and you were the one ballsy enough to actually submit it to the U.N.”

“Yeah, but the speech is literally on environmental preservation–”

“International NGO commitment to environmental preservation,” Minho interrupted, and you bit down the sudden flare of anger that he felt the need to correct you on your own fucking speech topic. “International commitment is your wheelhouse, isn’t it?”

“And Felix is literally specialising in environmentalism,” you reminded him, and it was then that one of your biggest concerns about this whole situation reared its head. “Which reminds me, actually, why did they pick you to replace him on it?”

Minho stared at you for a solid moment, eyebrows slowly raising, as if he couldn’t believe you were being serious.

You felt yourself bristling, growing defensive. “What? You’re a politics student, not–”

“My master’s thesis was literally on environmental activism. I help teach undergrad classes on green politics and ecological efforts in government policy. How do you not know this?”

…OK. So, fine, maybe you didn’t pay that much attention to what Minho actually studied. Why would you? You imagined it would only piss you off more, reading through his fucking glowing examples of academic writing – like, seriously, in your second year of undergrad, one of your professors used one of his essays as a literal example of how to do the assignment.

You scoffed, lifting your coffee up to your mouth, muttering under your breath. “Ego-logical efforts, more like.”

Minho tilted his head, clearly having heard every word you just said. “What was that?”

You stared him down, taking one long, unabashed drink of coffee, before setting your cup down. Maintaining eye contact, you forced your most innocent smile. “Nothing.”

Another moment of silence fell between the two of you, as Minho’s mouth twitched. You could tell he was very tempted to call you out, and you almost wanted to dare him to say something. Going this long without some kind of conflict with Minho felt…weird. Strange.

Instead, Minho sighed, and you couldn’t imagine the visible shock on your face when his expression actually softened towards you. “…Look. I know you really wanted to work with Felix on this. It’s really shitty that this got taken out of your hands.”

…What? What the fuck was happening here?

He continued. “I’m sorry you got screwed over like this.”

What the fuck was in this coffee?

“I’m not trying to butt in and mess with everything you’ve prepared,” Minho said. “I genuinely just want to help you. I know we’ve got…issues.”

“That’s a bit of an understatement.”

“Sometimes people just don’t get along,” Minho said, eyes flickering downwards to his mug as he took a sip of coffee. “But I hope we can be professional about this.”

You fought the urge to scowl, but you couldn’t quite stop yourself from clenching your jaw at the assumption.

You could be professional.

You could be insanely fucking professional.

“Yes, I hope we can,” you said, your voice perfectly level. Calm. Composed. Professional. “So, actually, until this speech is over…why don’t we call a truce?”

Minho blinked, caught off-guard by your choice of words. “‘Truce’?”

“Yeah. Until the speech is done, we’ll try to be nice to each other. No more arguments…” you trailed off, the words already sounding hollow and you were the one saying them. You backtracked slightly. “OK, maybe some academic debate. But nothing personal.”

“Nothing petty,” Minho added, giving you a pointed look.

It took an impressive amount of willpower to force your smile to stay on your face. “Exactly. We somehow managed it as kids. How hard could it be to do it again, for the next few months?”

Minho didn’t answer immediately, clearly thinking the proposition over.

You took another sip of coffee, trying your best to leave it at that. But you couldn’t help but add, pointedly. “I mean, I don’t think it’ll be hard for me. But if you think you–”

“I’ll manage,” Minho interjected, dryly, unimpressed. “You’re the one who starts it most of the time, anyway.”

“I don’t–” you bit your tongue, taking a second to claw back your patience. “…I mean, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure.”

You sat just a little taller, frowning. “OK. So, we’re decided.”

“Yep.”

“Truce?”

“Truce.”

“…Good.”

“Good.”

“Great,” you said, maybe just a little eager to get the last word. Maybe.

It was only when you took another sip of coffee, content with yourself, that Minho dropped the sudden curveball. “My housemates are throwing a Halloween party this weekend. Maybe you should come.”

You very almost did a spit-take with your coffee. “What?”

“If you’re so interested in a truce,” Minho added, tapping his fingers against the wooden surface of the table, and that was when you recognised the invitation for what it was.

A challenge.

Minho was absolutely trying to get you to chicken out.

You straightened your shoulders. “I’d be happy to,” you said, and it sounded vaguely threatening.

“Great, I’ll let them know.”

“Looking forward to it.”

“Me too,” Minho said, his words so edged, you could imagine them slicing into you.

Yeah, this truce was definitely going to last.

This was a terrible idea.

You hesitated on the pavement outside of what was very obviously a Halloween party in full swing. You’d purposely waited a little, hoping to avoid the awkward early stages of house parties, your imagination filled with dreadful images of being one of the first to show up and having to make conversation with Minho.

The later, the better. More people to act as a buffer, and a better excuse to get drunk.

Hopefully, fingers-crossed, maybe Minho had already gotten absolutely wasted and wouldn’t even notice you were there.

Bolstered by the thought, you shot a text to Felix – who should already be inside, having volunteered to swing by early and help his older brother with decorations – to say that you were here.

OK.

Breathe.

Go.

You marched up the path towards the front door, refusing to be distracted by the partygoers scattered around the front yard, smoking and chatting and one couple leaning against the wall and already looking very handsy.

The front door was open, and you made your way inside, senses alert for any sign of Felix (to approach) and Minho (to avoid) as you did so.

The house was impressively large for student housing – of course it was, Minho lived here – and yet, every room held a crowd of people. Dancing, drinking, having fun. A drunk girl, dressed in what looked to be some variation of zombie Disney princess, stumbled into you, giggling apologetically as she did. Her drink – a can of something, maybe a bottle – was icy-cold as it brushed against your thigh.

You should have worn something longer, you thought. Your costume was cute, and dare you say, maybe even kinda hot, but it was not cut out for any temperatures colder than a room full of warm bodies. Just the walk up to the house had you shivering, just a little.

Your hunt for Felix led you from room to room, as you tried and failed to prevent yourself from rolling your eyes at the size of this place. Someone had set up tables – multiple – for beer pong in one room, while another room hosted an impressive speaker system for dancing, while another room was all softly-lit and calm background music, clearly the designated room for quieter, laid-back conversation.

A layout that checked all the house party boxes, sure. But a terrible place to try and track someone down.

Eventually, somehow, you found yourself in the kitchen, and it was here that you wondered whether you should just give up for a second and grab something to drink. You’d find Felix at some point, hopefully. Just as long as you didn’t run into…

“Oh.”

You turned at the voice, instinctively, but on second thoughts maybe you should have pretended not to hear.

Minho was standing in front of you, leaning against the kitchen counter.

And he…

He looked…

Holy fucking shit.

From the fake blood on his billowy white shirt and the painted-on bite mark on his neck, he was clearly some kind of vampire. Someone – maybe Minho himself – had applied the subtlest amount of eyeliner, and between that and the rumpled dark hair, and the…

Fuck, those were leather pants. Skin-tight.

Oh, you had to leave right now–

“Hi,” you said, standing your ground.

“You’re late,” Minho noted.

It was only then that you realised Minho was part of a loose cluster of guys, all of whom turned to see who Minho was talking to.

And one of them, to your intense relief, was Felix.

“Hey!” Felix greeted, wandering over to throw an arm around you in a half-hug. He was a cheerful drinker, and you’d be lying if you said it didn’t help your confidence a little to see someone so unambiguously happy to see you here.

When he pulled away, you noticed that the little hand-drawn stitches around his neck had already started to smudge. Miraculously the little fake plastic bolts on either side of his head remained intact.

“I like your costume,” Felix told you. “It’s very…pink.”

“It is very pink,” you agreed, looking down at yourself.

When you glanced up, you caught the way Minho’s eyes flickered upwards too, as if he’d just finished looking you up and down.

You tensed a little, preparing yourself for some kind of critique. Lee Minho, champion appraiser of cheap Halloween costumes.

To your surprise, however, Minho quickly averted his eyes and took a deep swig of the drink in his hand.

“I like your costume too,” one of Minho’s friends chimed in. He was kind of cute, all dark hair and big brown eyes, so adorable that his werewolf costume came across as looking more like a chipmunk. “What are you?”

You smiled, relaxing a little. “The most accomplished woman of our time.”

The guy blinked, looking briefly thrown for a second, eyes back on your costume as he tried to decipher who you were.

But Minho, astonishingly, cracked a half-smile. Which, for Minho, was practically a laugh. “Are you Barbie?”

“Yes,” you admitted, reluctantly, half-tempted to lie just to be petty. Except, damn it, no more pettiness. You’d agreed.

“Barbie is the most accomplished woman of our time?”

“Princess. Astronaut. President. I am prepared to fight you on this.”

“Really?”

“Yes, and I’ll win.”

“Mm,” Minho hummed, and again, his gaze flickered downwards. What, was it so shocking to see you in pink?

You shifted your weight, and you almost folded your arms over your chest before you remembered what the neckline was like on this dress. Maybe not.

Unbeknownst to you, Felix and Minho’s friend exchanged a look.

Clearing your throat, you turned your attention to the large and varied alcohol selection littering the kitchen counter. “So, what can I get to drink here?”

“Minho can talk you through it,” Minho’s friend suddenly announced, patting Minho on the shoulder. Minho blinked, tearing his eyes away from you to look at his friend. “I’m gonna go find Chan, he promised me a beer pong rematch. Felix, bro, you should come with.”

Felix hesitated. “…Actually, maybe I–”

“Nah, come on,” Minho’s friend insisted, hooking his arm with Felix’s, cheerfully pulling him away. “Be my cheerleader.”

You stared, as it dawned on you that your biggest support in this minefield of a conversation was being frogmarched away.

Right. OK. Alone with Minho.

Cool.

You chanced a look back towards Minho, only to find him still watching you, and you quickly diverted your attention to the alcohol again. Smoothing down your skirt, you forced yourself to shrug. “I thought about coming as Frieda Dalen, but I figured no one would get the reference. She was–”

“The first woman to speak at the U.N., yeah.”

You snapped your head back to stare at him, bewildered. “How the fuck do you know that?”

Minho raised one eyebrow, and you were genuinely irritated that, in combination with the hair and the blood and the outfit in general, it almost…almost maybe twisted something in your gut. “My first official university debate was about the history of women in global affairs. She was a good factoid. 1946, right?”

You fought the urge to scowl as you confirmed his answer. “Yep. 1946.”

And, because even the tightest of leather couldn’t dull your burning dislike of seeing Minho smug, you pressed him further.

“Do you remember which country she was the delegate of?”

“No,” Minho admitted, tilting his head slightly to one side as he looked at you. After a moment, he straightened up from where he’d been leaning, gaining an inch or two of height in doing so, forcing you to tilt your chin up slightly to continue meeting his gaze. “Why don’t you tell me?”

His words should have sounded patronising.

Except, there was a strange edge to his voice, almost a playfulness but not quite. Not a lightness, because it definitely didn’t feel light. It felt kind of heavy, actually.

If you didn’t know any better, you would almost mistake it as…

“Minho!”

Both of you jolted at the sudden shout, barely having the time to turn towards it source before a tall guy with a Phantom of the Opera mask and ridiculously pretty long, blond hair staggered into Minho and hugged him.

You blinked, too caught off-guard to even appreciate the bemused expression on Minho’s face as the pretty guy mumbled into his shoulder. “Minho, I think…I’m druuunk.”

You took that as the perfect opportunity to back out of this…interaction with Minho, even as something strange twisted inside of you. You quickly grabbed the closest drink you could and retreated out of the kitchen as fast as your dignity would allow.

You needed to drink. And maybe dance. Anything to distract you, before your mind wandered anywhere dangerous.

This wasn’t working.

Drinking your problems away was a terrible idea in and of itself, but you’d been tempted to give it a go. After your second drink, however, you were blindsided with the intrusive thought of getting wasted and throwing up in Minho’s bathroom, and all the humiliation that could go with it, and it had warned you off alcohol for the rest of the night.

Dancing, your alternative solution, had worked for the first hour or so. You had let loose a little, but as your drink-fuelled buzz slowly faded, you found yourself growing increasingly uncomfortable by the stale air and the press of warm bodies. You were getting hot, something under your skin beginning to itch.

You needed to get out of here, just for a moment, to clear your head.

With crowds of people blocking your way to the front door, you decided on a different path towards some peace and quiet. Upstairs was mostly left untouched, understandable since there were no drinks to be found and no music playing, and you breathed out a sigh of relief when you reached the top of the stairs and turned a corner, and found an empty hallway.

Perfect.

Before you could think twice, you sat down on the floor, your back against the wall. The relief of taking a break from standing in these heels was immediate, and you let your head loll backwards, closing your eyes.

You just needed a few minutes here, you decided. Just to recharge.

“What are you doing?”

You didn’t open your eyes, but you felt your expression immediately sour. Of course it had to be the worst possible person to find you here, alone and close to misery, sitting in the hallway.

Minho approached, or at least, that was what you gathered from the sound of his footsteps. He came to a halt fairly close, pausing, and spoke up again.

“How are you this wasted already?” Minho asked, and there was surprisingly little amusement in his voice at the idea. In fact, you’d almost mistake it for concern.

“I am distressingly sober, actually,” you replied, slowly opening one eye to glare at him, but it was half-hearted at best, and you closed it again. “Just needed some quiet. Had a headache.”

Minho didn’t say anything in response. In fact, it was silent for so long, you started to wonder if he’d walked off without you even noticing, when he suddenly spoke up again. “I know a good place for quiet. And for fresh air, if you want it.”

Slowly, you opened your eyes again, fixing him with a look of suspicion. Admittedly, whatever he was suggesting sounded like the perfect place for you right now – which was exactly the reason you were so suspicious. “Where?”

“It’s pretty nearby,” Minho said, and to your disbelief, held out his hand.

Your eyes flickered from his face, to his outstretched hand, to his face again, before taking a deep breath and pushing yourself up to your feet by yourself. To his credit, Minho withdrew his hand smoothly, seemingly unaffected by your refusal to take it.

“After you,” you said, still reluctant to let down your guard.

Minho nodded, and set off down the hallway, going just a little further from where you were sitting, and stopping in front of a door. With a glance back to you, probably checking to see if you were still following, or if you’d lied about being sober and collapsed while he wasn’t looking, he opened it and wandered inside.

You took a few steps towards it – and then caught one look inside the room and halted dead in your tracks.

That was…

Was that…?

“Is that your fucking bedroom?” You asked, in pure disbelief.

Minho stopped, turning around to look at you, and how the fuck could he look so calm about this? “…Yeah? Last time I checked, why?”

“Why? Are you…” you trailed off, scoffing, before putting on your best Minho impression. “‘I know a good place, come follow me’ and it’s your bedroom. Come on.”

“I wasn’t…I was talking about the balcony. There’s a balcony through…” Minho gestured vaguely towards the far wall, where you realised the huge ceiling-to-floor curtains hanging there must be hiding the doors to it.

Of course he has a balcony.

Of course.

For once in his life, Minho looked just the slightest bit ruffled as he finally caught on to the incredibly obvious implications.

He swallowed. “Look, if you’re not comfortable, that’s–”

You interrupted him with a scoff. “I’m not uncomfortable.”

In fact, to prove just how comfortable you were, you marched into his room, forcing yourself to appear entirely unbothered.

“See? Fine,” you said. “Just, maybe lead with the balcony thing next time, so you don’t look like some massive sleaze.”

Again, Minho’s reaction surprised you. Instead of anger or annoyance at your accusation, Minho cracked another half-smile. “Fair.”

…Yeah, you really weren’t used to this whole ‘nice’ thing between the two of you. It felt weird, like the very foundations of your dynamic were shaken by it.

As Minho led you towards the balcony, you tried your best not to look too closely at his bedroom, as much as your curiosity protested otherwise. The most detail you got was that it was fairly neat, fairly clean, and he had a stupidly large bed. Which, you know, Minho, fuck-you money, that made sense.

You point-blank refused to dwell on it.

As soon as he slid open the door, you quickly leaned forward and breathed in that refreshing cold night air, and felt your headache fade just a little. It was only when you stepped out onto the balcony that you truly felt yourself relax, and the tension built up in your head began to ease.

“Better?” Minho asked, and you heard him come up from behind you, coming to a stop beside you to look up at the night sky. You couldn’t make out many stars from here, thanks to the light pollution of the city, but it was still undeniably a pretty cool view.

“Yeah,” you admitted and, begrudgingly, you turned towards him to mutter. “…Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“I won’t be too long out here,” you added, feeling the weirdest need to justify accepting this kindness from Minho, to downplay it. “I’m not exactly dressed for October weather.”

Minho paused, keeping his gaze fixed on the night sky above and very much not on you. “Yeah.”

…Yeah?

You frowned, unable to stop yourself from feeling slightly defensive. “I mean, you’re one to talk.”

That got his attention. Suddenly, Minho had no problem looking at you. “What?”

“Your pants, Minho. Did you paint them on yourself?”

And you realised then and there that you must have made some kind of error, because Minho looked genuinely amused. Glancing down at himself for a moment, his eyes wandered back up to meet yours, and there was a genuine note of curiosity in his voice. “What, do you like them?”

You stilled, faltering just slightly, before retorting. “I’d probably like the cow they’re made from more.”

“Don’t worry, they’re not real leather,” Minho quipped back. “If that’s your only issue with them.”

“Well, you know, the fake leather industry is actually…” you trailed off, because your comeback sounded lame even in your head. “Whatever.”

The two of you fell into a silence, both watching the stars for a moment, listening to the thud of the bass downstairs and the muffled cacophony of voices.

And then, quietly, reluctantly, Minho spoke. “…Can I ask you a genuine question?”

If it was about the pants, you might actually throw him off this balcony. “OK. You’re not guaranteed a genuine answer, but go ahead.”

“The U.N. speech. It was your idea. If you want to go into human rights, why are you doing a speech about the environment?”

You paused, genuinely flustered by his question. Your response came out jumbled. “I don’t…you know, the two aren’t mutually exclusive, environmental damage is having a huge impact on–”

“Yeah, but that’s not what the speech is actually about. It’s a great speech, but why isn’t it on a subject youwant to do?”

“Who says? You? You don’t know what I want,” you shot back, irritated, refusing to admit that he’d touched a nerve.

Rather than snapping back at you immediately, Minho took a deep breath, calming slightly. “…You’re right. I don’t. I shouldn’t assume.”

What was this? You didn’t want him to agree with you, you wanted an argument. This ‘nice’, truce stuff was really starting to grate on you. “Exactly.”

“It’s just…it’s important that you do what you want, and not try to shape yourself around other people.”

“I don’t,” you argued. “Maybe what I want is for you not to attack every little decision I make. Like you always do.”

Minho’s brow furrowed, his stance shifting slightly. It took a second to realise that he was appraising you, eyeing you thoughtfully.

“You…really seem to dislike me,” he noted.

“Oh, do I?” You remarked, bitterly.

“Why is that?”

You let out a deep breath, mostly out of frustration, but also a little out of exhaustion. Closing your eyes for a moment, you tried to construct some kind of response.

There seemed to be a multitude of answers to that question. Minho was arrogant. He was atrociously blunt in most social settings and seemed indifferent to the hurt he caused others. He had an exorbitant amount of money and had very few qualms showcasing it. He scared away almost every single new debate team recruit because he was apparently allergic to the concept of constructive criticism. He’d ruined more than one relationship you’d had. Apparently, you talked too much about him, but there were only so many ways to honestly answer questions about your day or how you were feeling without mentioning how aggravating Minho was in some capacity.

But honestly, the more you thought about it, the more you felt yourself slipping back into the shell of that little fourteen-year-old, looking up at the cool older boy with wide eyes and hoping for just one kind word.

And it made you feel so…small. Pathetic.

“Because you’re an asshole,” you stated, simply.

Minho stared at you for a second, before frowning slightly. “I mean, not really.”

…Oh, he decided to say just exactly the wrong thing there, didn’t he?

“You absolutely are. Like, objectively,” you argued. “You literally made a girl cry last week over debating.”

“What? Who?”

“That first-year girl. Dark hair, super perky. You know, when she’s not crying her eyes out.”

Something approaching recognition dawned on Minho’s face, but to your surprise, his expression dimmed slightly. “Oh, her. She told you it was about her debating?”

Well, not in exact words, you wanted to say. But it wasn’t hard to read between the lines, given what you knew Minho to be capable of.

“OK, then what was it about?” You asked.

“She came up to me after our last meeting and asked for some tutoring,” Minho said, before giving you a very pointed look. “As in, a specific kind of ‘private’ tutoring. Very specific. And she was not subtle about it.”

You blinked. “…What?”

Minho’s brow furrowed, visibly searching through his memory of the incident. “To be fair, I might have laughed in her face. In my defence, it was less about her and more about the audacity.”

You pictured the scene, of that girl coming onto Minho, his face when he realised what was happening, and the worst part of you maybe wanted to smirk a little. But you would not indulge it. “Still, sounds like you could have been nicer abut it.”

“OK, yeah, I feel a little bad. But no, it wasn’t over her debating skills. I might be harsh, but you think I’d make someone cry over that and not give a shit?”

Every ounce of amusement drained out of you in an instant, replaced by something cold. “I mean…yeah, you’ve done it before.”

“What? When?”

He didn’t know?

How could he not know?

You might have finished sobbing by the time you’d confronted him, all those years ago, but hadn’t it been extremely obvious?

You stared at Minho for a good few seconds, waiting for him to slip up, to give up the joke. But all you got in return was a genuinely confused expression on his face, waiting for you to clarify what exactly you were talking about.

Oh.

Yeah, he really didn’t know.

Shit.

You swallowed, looking down at your hands, picking at one particularly jagged edge of your thumbnail. “…Me.”

Minho stilled. You could feel his eyes burning into the side of your head, searching your face. “You cried?”

Oh, fuck this guy. You stiffened, embarrassment roiling in the pit of your stomach, and snapped, seething. “Just forget it–”

“No, I didn’t mean…” he trailed off. When you braved a look over at him, you didn’t find the smirk you were expecting. Minho looked genuinely chastened, watching you with a deep but unreadable emotion. “I…didn’t know.”

You didn’t like this, you didn’t know how to handle…earnest Minho. Where the fuck did asshole Minho go?

“It was just the once. It was my first debate, and you were a dick about it,” you said, forcing yourself to shrug.

“Oh,” Minho said, with such a strangely specific tone that you couldn’t help but look over at him. There was a look of dawning realisation on his face, and the slightest hint of…

Embarrassment?

“I think I remember that,” Minho said, sounding vaguely horrified. “…This is going to sound dumb.”

Minho? Dumb? And aware of that fact? “…OK.”

“And a little pathetic.”

“Good, go on.”

“But I think, at the time…I was hoping you’d ask me for help.”

You stilled, trying to comprehend the string of words that had just left his mouth. Trying to forge them into anything that made even the smallest bit of sense.

“…And you didn’t, I don’t know, think about offering your help? Before humiliating me in front of my classmates?” You asked, and you almost surprised yourself with the way your voice shook with an old, familiar anger. “That didn’t, you know, maybe occur to you?”

Minho turned his whole body to face you head-on, hand curling around the balcony railing at his side. It was in that moment, seeing him entirely, that you glimpsed that blunt, ruthless young man that had cut you so deeply all those years ago – and saw, for the first time, how small he really was. That memory had taken up so much space in your mind, had warped itself until Minho towered over you, a titan, a symbol of each and every one of your failings.

Now, for once, a new image appeared. An awkward teenage boy, too embarrassed to admit that he wanted to be something in your eyes.

You softened, just for a second.

And then, remembering yourself, remembering all that had happened between the two of you since then, you came back to your senses.

“And what about everything after? It’s not like you were nice after that one little misunderstanding, you picked at everything I did for years.”

“In my defence, neither were you. You refused to speak to me unless you had to for years,” Minho pointed out. “And I realised how much you could do, what you could achieve–”

“If you kept being an asshole?”

“If I held you to actual standards,” Minho corrected, and for the first time in this conversation, he was starting to get heated. Good. “The next time the club met, you wiped the floor with seniors. Seniors. You were just as good as me, and you barely had experience.”

A compliment from Minho, however begrudging and biting it was, had a dangerously addicting effect on you. Actually, maybe the begrudging part only made it better. “And what? That pissed you off?”

Minho’s expression faltered, just for a split-second, and that spoke more than any confession could.

“It did,” you said, half-shocked for a second, before pressing on. “So, you wouldn’t get off my fucking back foryears. You even turned up at nationals after you graduated, hoping I’d fall flat on my face.”

“Is that what you think?” Minho asked, incredulous.

“What else would it be?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe…” Minho stopped, before letting out a short, bitter laugh. “Never mind. Forget it.”

You wanted to press him further, but the anger that had sustained you so far was starting to flag a little.

This was just…exhausting, sometimes.

You let out a deep breath, just as a cold October breeze decided to kick up, making you shiver. Instinctively, you folded your arms over your chest, tucking your hands into your sides to get just a little bit of warmth.

Maybe it was time for you to leave.

You looked over at Minho, opening your mouth to say something–

Only to catch his gaze openly, unmistakably, dipping down towards your cleavage.

You stopped.

You stared.

His eyes moved upwards again, finding yours, and he realised he’d been caught.

He tensed, just for a second, and you watched a tangle of emotions play out across his face before he settled on a neutral, blank, composed expression. But he didn’t speak.

He just…looked at you.

Waiting for you to say something? Daring you to say something?

It was hard to decipher, because at that moment, your brain was still 100% stuck on the fact that Minho had been checking you out.

Because that wasn’t some little accidental flicker, his gaze had stayed there.

Minho had been absolutely, undeniably, checking you out.

For all your complaints about the cold weather, it was starting to get very warm out here.

Why the fuck wasn’t he saying something? Anything?

You swallowed – or, well, you tried to at least.

Something had awoken, deep in the pit of your stomach. You felt it starting to unfurl, slowly, your nerve endings beginning to prickle.

“Are you…” you didn’t finish the question, you couldn’t finish the question, because the words ‘are you into me?’ were so laughably alien that they just refused to leave your mouth.

Minho waited, expectant for something, searching your face. Whatever he found – or didn’t find – was enough to make him speak.

“What?” he asked, and it was that same voice he had in the kitchen. Quiet, loaded, just a touch lower in register that almost made your breath catch.

It was like he was challenging you. Goading you. Wondering whether you were too much of a coward to finish that question.

You needed to ask. You needed to say it.

Come on, you were about to talk to the fucking United Nations in a few months, surely you could handle asking one question to Lee fucking Minho.

“Are you…attracted to me?”

Already, you were starting to cringe internally. Already, you were preparing for the worst. You tried to reassure yourself that it was fine, that when he said ‘no’ you could call him out on staring at your chest, he had no room to speak, it was a logical question, it…

Except Minho didn’t say ‘no’.

He didn’t say anything.

And the longer he looked at you, the longer he stayed silent, the more obvious his answer became.

…Oh.

That…

Maybe you were drunk, actually. Surely you had to be. Because the idea that Minho found you attractive didn’t drive you off like you thought it would.

Minho found you attractive.

Minho, the man with an ego so large it could smother a man, a superiority complex so vast it could bring awe-stricken observers to tears, that Minho…found you attractive.

Huh.

As you stared back at him, you were hit with the sudden thought of kissing him.

Which would be a terrible idea.

Because Minho was Minho and just because he was into you, just because he was perhaps objectively maybe a little good-looking, just because he’d admitted that all these years he’d seen you as an intellectual equal, just because he had the kind of thighs that could probably crush a watermelon, he…

He…

You paused, mind-blank, before rising up on your toes and pressing your lips to his.

The first few seconds were strange. Of course they were, it was surreal to feel someone’s lips on yours and know this was Minho, holy shit. You could feel how still he was, how shocked, and you knew he must have been on the exact same wavelength.

And then, he closed his eyes, his hand lifted up to gently cup your cheek, and everything clicked together perfectly.

This felt right, like really weirdly right despite it all. Some kind of base level of brain chemistry was screaming about how right this was, and it had you shivering in a way that had nothing to do with the cold.

Was this a bad idea? The two of you had to work together for the next few months, you should have been aiming to keep things strictly professional, personal issues could complicate–

Minho let out the tiniest exhale, recapturing your lips immediately, and your thoughts stopped dead in your tracks.

Fuck professionalism, you’d earned this, you’d been working your ass off for months, you deserved to take satisfaction whenever you could get it.

You looped your arms around his neck, pulling yourself up slightly to press the entirety of your front against his. He was warm, shockingly so, and when his free hand moved to press itself into the small of your back, you chanced parting your lips just a little.

Minho followed suit, deepening the kiss, angling his head just slightly. Everything about his touch, how he held you, it was all so strangely gentle in comparison to the usual way he treated you. As if you were an illusion, like if he squeezed too hard, you might disappear.

One of your hands came up to run your fingers up his neck, through his hair, and the drag of your fingernails coaxed a quiet hum out of him.

Every noise you pulled from Minho, every little reaction, felt like winning an argument. It felt like a strange natural extension of your debates, isolating the weakness in the other’s defence and targeting it.

You let your fingers tangle in his hair, biding your time, and when you tested a sharp little twist, you heard his breath catch.

Minho went still, just for a second, just enough to take a deep breath, before grabbing your hip and swinging you around, pushing you up against the sliding balcony door, trapping you between it and him.

The impact was enough to knock a gasp out of you, and he pulled away briefly. You watched him, cheeks flushed, eyes dark, breath heavy, as he tried to form words. “Fuck, are you–”

You pulled him back to you, a hand fisted in his shirt collar, too impatient to let him finish the rest of his question. Your kiss was rushed, insistent, and you took your time before you pulled away to mutter against his lips. “I’m fine. Just…fuck it, just keep kissing me.”

Minho’s head dipped towards yours, briefly, as if he were about to do just that – before he paused. “…Ask me nicely.”

“Fuck off,” you snapped, impulsively, heat rushing to your face.

He pulled his head away, his whole body even, until the two of you were just barely touching. He lingered, teasingly close, an amused glint in his eye. “Why, is that want you want? Me to fuck off?”

You didn’t know if he was being sincere or not. You never knew if he was being sincere or not. That was Minho, through and through.

You scrabbled for an answer, brain still sluggishly working through the fact that you weren’t kissing anymore, chest rising and falling with every quickened breath. You found your words, looking him directly in the eye, tilting your chin up slightly.

“Kiss me,” you said, practically venomous, before setting your jaw. “Or I’ll find someone else to do it for you.”

You didn’t know why that was the threat you made. Logically, it held no weight – Minho might have been attracted to you, but would he really care if you kissed someone else? You half expected him to laugh you off, and wander off back to the party without even a glance back at you.

He did neither of those things.

In fact, the teasing look in his eye vanished completely. His gaze turned so intense that you wondered if he could burn a hole straight through you.

When he finally spoke, he was deceptively calm, his voice perfectly even as he noted out loud. “I see. So, that’s how we’re playing this.”

You barely had time to process his words, before his mouth was back on yours, almost feverish, and with a newfound harshness.

You met him with just as much enthusiasm, matching him move-for-move.

A gentle Minho was too complicated. A soft, kind Minho forced you to confront some preconceived notions that you were very happy to keep unchallenged.

This Minho, the one who dragged his right hand down your side, the one who gripped your hip so tightly you could imagine it bruising, this was something you could handle. Something you didn’t have to overthink.

Because, fuck, you really, really didn’t want to think right now. You were sick of thinking, your whole life was thinking.

Minho’s hand slipped downwards to your thigh, his palm sliding around to the back of it before he lifted your leg up slightly to slot his thigh right between yours.

The instant he lowered your leg, you realised exactly what he’d done. Immediately, you felt the press of him between your legs, subtle enough to allow plausible deniability, and yet too firm for you to just ignore. To make matters worse, you were now just slightly off-balance, your foot just brushing the floor.

You couldn’t lower it, you couldn’t regain your balance, without pressing down even more on his thigh. You tried anyway, and the friction resulted in your first whimper of the night, light and breathy against him.

Minho’s grip, still on your leg, tightened.

He dropped his head to press his mouth to your neck, kissing at the skin there – and then he clenched his fucking thigh muscles, and your resulting moan slipped out right by his ear.

Your hands scrambled for him, clutching his shoulders, breath heavy as you tried not to rock your hips. You couldn’t give him the satisfaction, you absolutely refused to. You grabbed a fistful of his hair again, pulling by the roots to drag his head back upwards so your mouths could meet again.

Your kiss was now heated, almost clumsy. You caught Minho’s bottom lip between your teeth and nipped, enjoying the way he hissed, the way his tongue licked over where you’d done it, the way his left hand came up to your face – not to cradle this time, but to clutch, to grip.

His right hand moved up to your ass, giving it one firm squeeze, before suddenly and very deliberately pulling you down and along his thigh. More noises fought their way out of your mouth, and you were too weak to resist just one roll of your hips, chasing that same friction. It had barely been a few minutes, and you could already feel yourself starting to ache, heat beginning to collect at the apex of your thighs.

It was gratifying to learn, when you pulled Minho even closer, forcing the full length of his body to press against yours, that you weren’t alone in that. You felt something firm beginning to press into your hip, and when you slid your hand down to confirm what it was, palm sliding against it, Minho inhaled sharply.

You grinned against his lips, and squeezed him through those damned fake-leather pants.

He groaned, eyes drifting shut for just a second, before suddenly snapping open.

“Come on,” he said, swallowing, and took you by the wrist. Before you knew it, he pulled you away from the balcony door to slide it open again, and hurriedly tugged you inside.

You had been a little too distracted to notice how much colder it must have turned outside, but inside welcomed you with a warmth that radiated through your whole body.

But it took you a moment, brain still in a thigh-induced haze, to realise the full extent of what it meant to be inside.

To be inside Minho’s bedroom.

You hesitated as Minho slid the balcony door shut behind you, drawing the curtains together.

You stared ahead, eyes on that huge bed – and the first hints of panic seized your chest.

Quickly, almost unthinkingly, you grabbed Minho by the arm and pulled him. He stumbled, clearly caught off-guard, but he went along with it, letting you pull him to you and turn, pressing him up against the wall.

Easy. Your back was to the bed now, removing it from your sight, and that strange new weight of anxiety disappeared entirely. You went back to kissing him, hands back in his hair. Your new comfort zone, apparently.

Apparently, however, you didn’t entirely fool Minho, who must have picked up on your tension at least a little.

“I thought,” he murmured, between kisses, and made no move to grab at you like he had outside, “you might want,” more kisses, “some more privacy.”

You hummed, non-committal, your concerns already disappearing as you tried to figure out how to get Minho’s leg back between yours again without outright asking.

“Outside, people can…” he paused, probably because your nails had scraped along his scalp almost accidentally, and he shivered, “hear.”

You pulled away slightly, hiding how breathless you were, fixing him with a playful look.

“Hear what?” you challenged, pretending as if you hadn’t literally moaned in his ear just a short while ago.

Minho didn’t answer, but you knew that expression. It used to keep you awake at night, anger burning through you at just the thought of it. He was smug.

Surprisingly, the sight no longer filled you with burning rage – but it did prompt you to back him up against the wall again, stepping right back into his personal space, and pull his head down to kiss you again.

He relaxed into you, soft and gentle as his hands eased over your sides, which only served to wind you up more. Frustrated, you tugged at his shirt, pulling it up and out from where it had been tucked into his waistband, and let your hand snake up under it.

You had learned over the course of the evening that Minho, as mouthy as he liked to be around you, wasn’t the most vocal partner you’d encountered. Maybe that would have discouraged the average person, but you knew Minho. You’d known him for years, you knew every tell he had, the meaning behind every hint of body language.

You knew that when Minho’s breath caught, as your hands ran up his stomach, up his chest, exploring his upper body, it was basically his equivalent of shaking with anticipation.

You took the hint, grasping his shirt with both hands and pulling it upwards. The shirt – some kind of billowy white poet’s shirt, the kind with the little lace-up ties at the neck that he’d left undone and open – was loose enough to remove easily, and you let it drop without a second thought.

Even now, despite everything, you were reluctant to stroke Minho’s ego by openly ogling him. It was a challenge, trying to ignore the smooth skin, the lean muscle, so you dipped your head before he could see your reaction, pressing open-mouthed kisses to the underside of his collarbone.

Again, it felt like a special talent to recognise Minho’s deep inhale, when your hands brushed his chest, for the emotions it betrayed.

Your mouth descended lower, eager, towards his chest – and you let your tongue brush his nipple.

His breath caught again, and when you experimented with a quick nip of your teeth, his grip on your sides tightened briefly.

That was Minho’s equivalent of being horrendously, painfully turned on.

Your hand slid down past his abdomen, cupping him through his pants, and this time you let your palm gently grind against him.

Minho’s body shivered under your touch, and it felt like winning.

And then, suddenly, as if he had somehow read your mind, he scrambled for the zipper of your dress, determined to even the playing field. You briefly pictured denying him, pictured staying clothed while undressing Minho, having that kind of advantage over him.

Tempting, maybe. But then you imagined the feel of Minho’s hands on your bare skin, and you made your decision pretty quickly.

Minho pulled down your zipper, building anticipation as he hooked two fingers under each of your spaghetti straps and slowly peeled your dress from you, letting it pool around your ankles.

His eyes dropped, and his expression changed.

“Oh, wow.”

You couldn’t help but grin slightly, glancing down at what you knew Minho was staring at. Your underwear was a matching set of pastel pink silk, with little hints of lace and ribbon, even a bow or two. You’d taken one look at it and knew it screamed princess.

“I always commit to my costumes,” you replied, refusing to feel even the smallest hint of embarrassment. It was hard to feel so anyway, with Minho staring down at you with dark eyes, drinking the sight in, amusement long since shifted into something else entirely.

He reached forward, tracing the ribbon at the edge of your bra cup with his thumb, before letting it sweep down over the lace – and right over the peak of your nipple, eliciting a sharp inhale from you. “Were you expecting someone to see it?”

“No,” you admitted, half-tempted to arch your back, just to press your breast into the curve of his palm. “Nothing about this was expected.”

Minho hummed quietly in agreement, still taking his time admiring you. He grabbed at your breast, not quite rough but not entirely gentle, fingers splayed, making sure to drag his thumb back over your nipple as he did so. “I never imagined you wearing something like this.”

You were so focused on the weight of his hand on your chest that you almost missed the implication. Almost. “Imagined? You imagined?”

Minho’s eyes darted up to meet yours, looking caught out for just a moment before his expression smoothed again. “Sometimes. Occasionally.”

OK, you had to ask. “What did you imagine?”

“Not this,” Minho stated, stubborn, refusing to give a single detail.

Your mind whirred at the possibilities anyway. What? Did that mean it was the complete opposite of this? What was the opposite of this sugary pink ensemble? Black, sexy? Leather? A whole dominatrix-style thing, was that what Minho was into?

“Tell me,” you demanded, incredibly curious now.

He hesitated, before sighing. “…You know that red skirt you wear sometimes?”

Well, that was not where you thought this was going. “Yeah?”

“I’ve thought about you wearing it at debating. You’re stood behind the podium, most of you hidden from sight,” Minho described, and his voice slowly began to shift. “I’m stood behind you, like I’m reading your notes over your shoulder. You don’t look at me, but your legs part, just a little.”

Your breath caught, as his left hand brushed against your inner thigh, fingertips stroking circles into the sensitive skin there.

“You let me slide my hand up,” he continued, and slowly, his hand begins to drift upwards. “Because you want me to know you aren’t wearing anything underneath.”

Holy shit.

“And you want me to feel how wet you are, waiting for me,” Minho said, pausing his hand just a few inches from the edge of your underwear, waiting as he checked your face for any signs of protest.

You couldn’t imagine what exactly your expression was, but you’re certain that protest was probably the furthest fucking thing from it.

And so, his hand moved, cupping you through your underwear, feeling just how damp the fabric was. Your breath rushed out shakily at the first moment of contact, almost akin to a gasp, body shuddering.

“That’s what I imagine,” he said, and fucking shrugged, even as his thumb pressed directly against your clit.

You moaned, your hand immediately flying up to clutch at his shoulder for balance. Everything about Minho’s touch, the pressure, the pace, screamed relaxed. He wasn’t trying to do anything but just…touch you. Gauge your reaction.

You closed your eyes, dropping your forehead to his shoulder, as his fingers continued to work small, slow circles around your clit, still over the barrier of your excessively pretty underwear.

“Should have known,” you murmured, trying not to gasp, and trying not to push your hips towards his hands. “You’re the type to tease.”

Minho’s voice came low from somewhere above your ear, as his hand moved at that same maddening pace. “Not usually.”

“Ah,” you breathed, understanding. He was on the exact same wavelength as you. Every reaction sparked from the other was a victory, to be enjoyed, to be savoured. “I get it. I’m special.”

Minho murmured something under his breath, something you couldn’t quite make out, and pressed just a little firmer against you. You moaned from the surprise of it, burying your face further into his neck.

Beneath your hand, you could feel his dick twitch, now so firm and so insistently pressing against your hand that you knew it had to be aching, trapped in those skin-tight pants like that.

You moved your hand up, struggling briefly with how tightly his waistband sat around his hips, before your hand suddenly slipped inside, fingers grazing roughly against something slick and warm and hard.

Minho finally moaned, loudly, openly, hips bucking briefly up into your hand. “Shit.”

“What was that you were saying?” you asked, innocently, running your fingers back over what you knew to be his cockhead, teasing. “About no underwear?”

Minho sucked in a breath, and from where your head was resting in the crook of his neck, you could hear him swallow. “…These were already too fucking small.”

“They are stupidly tight.”

“Don’t act like you – fuck,” he hissed, cutting himself off. Probably because you’d squeezed him again.

His free hand found its way to the corner of your jaw, prying your face away from his neck so he could duck his head down and kiss you, hungrily. You reciprocated, basking in the way he groaned against your mouth.

And then, he asked. “Bed?”

You stilled, hesitating. “…Bed?”

Minho paused, pulling away a little to take in your expression. Immediately, you did your best to smooth it out, to appear unbothered, casual, fine.

He wasn’t fooled. “Is something up?”

You swallowed, still trying to maintain your composure. “Besides your dick? No.”

Minho raised an eyebrow, and faked one short, sharp laugh. “Ha. You’re so funny when you dodge the subject.”

“I’m not dodging anything,” you argued.

He paused again, waiting, watching you. And, after a moment, he pulled his hand away from your underwear to wrap around your wrist, gently tugging your hand out of his pants.

“OK, fine,’” you relented, composure cracking. That old familiar dread returned, lodging itself in the pit of your stomach. “I just don’t…do this. All this,” you said, gesturing between the two of you, and towards the room at large. “The way it’s all spontaneous, I mean.”

“Me neither,” Minho said, calmly, still waiting expectantly. “What else?”

Fucker.

You scowled, jaw clenching, teeth gritted as you admitted. “And my experience in general, is…one could say limited.”

“I figured as much.”

“Rude,” you pointed out, vaguely offended. You’d had this man fucking shivering from just touching him. And what? Now, he was calling you inexperienced? Amateurish? Like he could tell the whole time? Bullshit.

“No, not…” Minho cleared his throat, looking mildly exasperated. It was a look you often inspired in him. “I don’t mind. That’s why I’m saying this, because I don’t want you pretending when it comes to shit like this. If you’re not going to be honest, I don’t want it.”

Honest.

Shit.

You hesitated, debating internally, weighing the pros and cons in your head. It was so fucking Minho to pick the most aggravating time to do the right thing. Of course, the one time that him being an asshole worked in your favour, he refused to do it.

“Fine,” you snapped, crossing your arms over your chest. “Fine. OK.”

He waited, eyes on you, and you couldn’t stop yourself from averting your gaze, looking up at the ceiling.

“Technically…technically,” you repeated, with emphasis, “one might argue that…I haven’t had sex yet.”

Minho stilled, staring at you, eyes widening.

You swallowed, trying to stay firm. “It’s really not a big deal…”

“It is,” Minho argued, tersely, but when you looked at his face, there wasn’t a hint of anger. There was, however, a strong hint of guilt in his eyes. You could practically see his thoughts, the way he replayed everything he’d done tonight, the fear that he’d done too much, come on too strong, picturing you as some blushing innocent virgin he’d deflowered–

“I’ve done everything else,” you said, eager to clear up that misconception. You were far from innocent, there was just one particular act you hadn’t gotten around to. “Hands, oral, all that. Done it. It’s literally the one thing that hasn’t…like, I’ve had relationships, it just never reached the point that…”

It always went around in circles. You wanted your relationship to be serious, to be settled and firmly established and in a good place before it happened – but the time it took to get there made your partners panic, made them think that to go so long without sex, without wanting them, the relationship must actually secretly be failing. And then you’d break up, and you’d be even more guarded and hesitant the next time, and on it went.

“And I’ve been busy with school and my career anyway,” you added, swallowing, forcing a shrug. “Who has the time?”

Minho was still staring at you, but at least the guilt had faded away.

He’d made no move to get away from you, at least, so you took this as a good sign. With a deep breath, you turned around and took slow, measured steps towards that ridiculously large bed, and looked him dead in the eye as you made a point of sitting down on it.

Doing your best to sound certain, reassuring, convincing without leaving a single bit of room for doubt, you spoke.

“I’m happy and comfortable with everything but sex-sex happening. So, if you want that…” you trailed off, trying to think of a polite way to phrase the thought in your head, before giving up with a shrug. “Tough shit, I guess. That’s my line in the sand. Everything else is fair game, though, so don’t get all…weird about it.”

“I’m not getting weird about it,” Minho said, stubbornly.

“You were. Just a little. Like you’re afraid to break me or something.”

Something sparked in Minho’s eyes, and he smiled slightly. “I’d never think I could do that.”

“Good, because you can’t,” you repeated, firmly. “There, honesty. Done. So, either come over here or leave.”

“Leave my own room?” Minho asked, amused.

“Yeah,” you said, doubling down, leaning back to plant both hands behind you on the bed. “It’s my room now.”

For a second, it looked like Minho was going to laugh. And then you caught the way his eyes began to lower, following the lines of your body, the way you were sitting on his bed, clad only in underwear, waiting.

He exhaled slowly, appreciatively. “…This is happening.”

You weren’t sure if that was aimed at you, or himself, but either way it didn’t matter much when he crossed the room in a flash. Barely taking the time to plant one knee into the mattress beside you, his mouth was on yours, hand on the back of your head.

It was a gentle gesture, sweet even, how he cradled the back of your head.

So, just to be certain that he knew exactly where you stood, and exactly how much patience you had for gentleness, you took his other hand and slid it into your panties.

Minho groaned, pulling away from the kiss to look down, and you felt his fingers slip through your folds, the movement made slick and easy by the way you were soaked.

“You’re so impatient,” he muttered, but he didn’t sound particularly annoyed about it. “All the time.”

“Yeah,” you replied, unapologetic. “I know what I want.”

“Mmhm. And so do I,” he said, and pulled his hand out of your underwear. You opened your mouth to argue, to question why, until you felt his hands move to your back, to the fastening of your bra.

He unhooked it easily, sliding the straps off your shoulders. Pushing up from the bed to stand tall, Minho let the bra fall from his hands, before reaching down to grab at your waist and pull you to standing.

He kissed you again, briefly, ignoring your bewildered expression, before switching your positions – him sat on the bed, you standing over him.

“These are staying on. They’re a bitch to peel off,” he told you, and your gaze was practically glued to his hand as it ran up his faux-leather-clad thigh before he gestured to your underwear. “It’s up to you, what you do with those.”

Your hand, unthinkingly, drifted to the lacy hem of your underwear.

“…What, no preference?” you asked him.

Minho stared at you, eyes dark, the corners of his mouth twitching ever so slightly with knowing, and didn’t reply.

Heat flooded your belly. You swallowed once, and hooked your fingers around your waistband, stripping out of your underwear before you could think twice.

He reached for you immediately, his hands on your hips, pulling you towards him. From what you could tell, he seemed to be guiding you towards straddling his lap – to which you took the slightest detour at the very last second, planting your knees either side of his thigh, the very same one that had been pushed between your legs on that balcony.

How very familiar a feeling. And yet, how very different, because now you were pressed against Minho’s naked chest, and when you kissed, one hand went straight to your bare breast, the other arm hooked around your bare waist.

Logically, you should have felt exposed – but there was very little room for logic here, not when Minho was squeezing you so tightly against him. You felt…enveloped by him. By his warmth.

It was…nice.

And then you finally let go of those last few traces of stubborn pride, and let yourself grind down on his thigh, and it was fucking fantastic.

You moaned, breaking the kiss to press your forehead against his, and rocked your hips faster. His thigh was so solid under you, thick bands of muscle from a lifetime of sports, clenching and unclenching. Heat pooled in your gut, spiking with every rock of your hips, every drag of your clit against him.

You felt Minho’s hand drop from your waist to curl around your hip, gripping tightly, urging you to keep moving. You pulled your face away from his, just in case – headbutting him in the nose, no matter the context, would very probably be a mood-killer – and instead lowered your head to plant kisses on the side of his neck.

Minho tilted his head back, just a little, granting you better access, his breath escaping him in one long, shaking exhale. You were forced to grip onto his shoulder with one hand, just to steady yourself, still grinding down on him.

Tension built between your legs, pulsing with every heartbeat as you continued to grind against him, and your kisses grew clumsier. Open-mouthed, harsher, teeth scraping against sensitive skin in a way that left Minho gasping.

“If I left marks, would it…” your voice was sluggish, raspy, dazed, “would…can I?”

It was a silly question, because the obvious answer was ‘no’, he wasn’t going to want any reminders of this temporary lapse in sanity.

And yet, Minho’s reply was immediate. “Yes. Yeah, you can, if…that’s…”

He broke off, with a noise so low in his throat that you could almost feel his chest vibrate from it, as your mouth latched onto his neck.

Your movements weren’t deliberate, not exactly. You had no strict intentions of marking up Minho’s skin, but it was just whenever it felt good. With every new sudden jolt of sensation shooting through your body, you sucked, leaving a path of your own pleasure scattered intermittently along his neck, the base of his throat, the swells and dips of his collarbone.

Minho reacted to each, and when you thought to look down, you saw his dick straining against his pants, so much so that it was even starting to pull his waistband away from his skin, revealing glimpses of what lay underneath.

You watched his hand lower to his crotch, as he tried to adjust himself, to figure out a way out of his discomfort. Without thinking, you reached down and pushed his hand away, letting your own slide into his paints.

Minho sharply inhaled, as you slid the palm of your hand over the head of him, letting your fingers grow slick, before wrapping your hand around his length.

He was hard, very obviously and very painfully hard.

And all of that was because of you.

Because he wanted you.

You felt your body physically judder at the thought, your thighs clamping around his. Something sparked inside of you. Up until now, you’d been turned on – obviously. You were naked on Minho’s bed and straddling his thigh, of course you’d been turned on, but it had been manageable. Like burning coals, smouldering, blazing hot to the touch, sure, but under control.

This, seeing him like this, was as if someone had jabbed right in the heart of those coals, oxygen rushing in and flames erupting, sparks crackling in the air. No longer under control, but all-consuming and desperate.

The muscles of your core clenched so tightly that it was almost painful, and with a ragged breath, you finally began to ride in earnest.

Minho clutched you with one hand as you moaned, his other snaking down to join yours on his dick. You let him guide your hand, controlling how hard you squeezed him, how slow you pumped him. Honestly, at this point, you didn’t have the concentration for it on your own, not when your legs were starting to shake with every new press of his thigh. You could feel something build, like a wave swelling, the crest just in sight but not quite…

“That’s it,” he murmured, and pressed a kiss to your chest. His eyes were dark when he pulled back, watching the way you bounced. “You’re…God, you’re fucking hot, do you know that?”

His words only drove you further, stoking something within you, and you moaned in response.

“Oh, is that what you like?” Minho asked, eyes lighting at his new discovery. His moved the hand on your waist to settle on your breast, squeezing lightly. “Me telling you how good you look?”

“Minho,” you muttered, half-warning, half-longing.

“With our history, I’d have thought you liked me mean,” he continued, and you should have wondered where that smart mouth of his had been this whole time.

He leaned in, kissing your neck, following upwards, until he reached your ear.

“But that’s not it,” he observed, murmuring into your ear. His hand – the one on yours, the one helping you stroke his dick – quickened, gripping yours just a little tighter, and his breath caught for a second, before continuing. “You want to hear how good you feel. How good you are.”

You whined, your body faltering for a beat, before picking up again.

“That’s it, isn’t it? You like praise,” he said, so very confident. Knowing, almost, like there was something else to it. Something he recognised, intrinsically. “You want me to admit how…fucking perfect I think you are.”

“Minho.”

You felt him twitch under your hands, felt the way he reacted to the way you breathed his name.

“Because you are,” he said, the words falling from his lips, as you grew even more frantic. “You are, you are, you’re good, you’re perfect, you’re…fuck, keep going. I can feel how wet you are, you…”

Fuck, fuck, it was too good. Too good and yet not good enough. There were tears in your eyes and your legs burned from how tightly they were clamped around Minho’s thigh, how desperately you’d ridden him, trying to chase an orgasm you just…you just couldn’t quite…

“Maybe you should fuck me,” you whined, voice hoarse, shaking. You’d spent the last five minutes essentially edging yourself, your brain was fried, and all you could imagine was how easy it would be for Minho to pull you over just a short distance onto his dick, let it fill you, maybe it…

“Don’t. Fuck, don’t say that,” Minho gasped, trying and failing to make it sound insistent, final. You could see the effects of your words. He was tempted, he was sorely fucking tempted. You knew he was picturing the exact same thing that you were. “I’m not taking your virginity at a fucking house party. You…”

He broke off with a moan, letting whatever words that would follow die on his tongue as you squeezed him.

“I need…I need more,” you gasped, through gritted teeth. Your body was starting to betray you, your legs starting to give out before you could reach your climax.

You buried your face in his neck, panting.

“I can’t…fuck,” you moaned, before one little word fell from your lips, the one word he’d asked for so long ago, out on the balcony, “Please.”

With a sudden, sharp breath, Minho hooked his arm around you and rolled you over, pressing you into the mattress. Your hand slipped out of his pants as he moved, hurriedly, down your body.

He paused at the apex of your legs, glancing up. “Are you OK with–”

“Yes,” you hissed, your hand fisting in his hair and pushing him downwards. You were so close, you were so close, and his thigh wasn’t between yours anymore, and you just couldn’t… “Yes, fuck, please.”

You could glimpse the beginnings of a smirk as he followed your hurried pushing, but before you could even register it, you felt him lick one long stripe along you, and your head emptied of all thoughts.

His mouth was hot and wet and almost immediately targeted your clit, leaving you shaking as you ground up into his face without shame, chasing the orgasm that had been just inches away for so fucking long. You could barely breathe from it, each breath wracking your body in almost-sobs, every muscle stiff and coiled in desperation.

You felt Minho hook an arm under your leg, pulling it up so that it could sit on his shoulder, parting you just a little wider.

You arched your back, your head pressing even further into the mattress, eyes squeezing shut. When you spoke, it was barely coherent, a loose string of words. “…H-hands, fingers…please, whatever it…Minho, I’m so close, I’m…ah…”

You felt him slide in a finger – two fingers? More? You didn’t know, you didn’t care, you just knew how close to the edge you were. Your muscles were locking up, body shaking, even as Minho placed his free hand on the curve of your hip, thumb brushing your skin in small, reassuring strokes.

Your grip in his hair tightened, mind going blank, tears in your eyes as you gasped. “Yes, keep – keep…keep–”

You came, and it felt like shattering. Your body’s muscles locked, rigid, shaking, as your own moans rang in your ears. At some point, your thighs had clamped around Minho’s head, your one anchor as you tried to come back down to earth.

It was like every rational thought, anything with even the slightest bit of complexity to it, evaporated. You were left weightless, on your back, dazed. Slowly, sluggishly, your gaze drifted to Minho.

What a sight, you thought. Pretty.

His cheek was pressed into the flesh of your inner thigh, skin flushed so pink, head tilted down so that most of his face was hidden by his rumpled hair. He was kneeling, and you saw that his hand had returned to his dick. It was as if he were trying to be discreet, almost quiet, even as he desperately pumped himself.

Barely even thinking about it, you reached down. His breath caught when you wrapped your own hand around him again, letting him guide your movements once more.

His head lifted, and you caught a glimpse of his dark brown eyes looking up at you. Always so unreadable, even now, even when burning.

Your mouth moved before your thoughts could catch up. “You’re…”

You didn’t know how to finish that. Gorgeous? Annoying? Terrifying?

All of it was true, none of it felt right to say in that moment.

You just watched him, eyes locked, until he choked out a moan, squeezed his eyes shut, and came with a soft, low, “fuck.”

It felt dirty, almost voyeuristic, to watch him cum. But even if you didn’t look, you still would have heard him, you still would have felt it on your hands, your thighs. You still would have felt the way he slumped forward, head dropping to your chest, forehead pressed against the valley between your breasts, his quick, deep breaths against your skin.

You still would have felt the way it all fell quiet – until it was just you, Minho, and the impending repercussions of what just happened.

What you’d done.

What had you done?

Your head dropped back against the mattress, looking up at Minho’s ceiling but not really seeing it, as your senses slowly returned to you.

Shit. Fuck. Every other fucking expletive, they all ran through your head.

What the fuck had you–

Minho cleared his throat, lifting his head up off of you. You could feel the weight of his gaze on your face, and you tried to school your expression into something neutral, pushing down the storm of thoughts in your mind.

You didn’t know why, but you expected him to withdraw from you immediately. Maybe that was doing him a disservice, but it was true.

That was why you were so surprised by the kiss he pressed to your temple, strangely gentle, even as his usual sardonic tone crept back into his voice as he spoke. “Let’s clean up first, overthink later.”

“I’m not overthinking,” you argued immediately, because old habits died hard even in a fucking surreal situation like this.

He didn’t laugh, but there was the slightest twitch to the corner of his mouth as he replied. “Sure.”

He sat up, and you caught the way he winced, probably in newfound discomfort over the state of his…current attire. While he attempted to strip out of his ruined pants with anything close to dignity, you pushed yourself up to a seated position, trying to look anywhere but him.

What now? What now? It was all well and good for him not to overthink, but you couldn’t drive away the sudden flood of consequences that threatened to overwhelm you. Of all times, why did it have to be now, when you were forced to interact with Minho so much more? You’d have to work with this man for the next few months, fuck, you had to talk at the U.N. with him. What would people say?

What would Felix say?

Something powder-blue and soft entered your field of vision, smelling of detergent and lavender fabric softener. You blinked, looking up to find Minho offering you a towel, and you wondered how long you must have zoned out, wrapped in your own thoughts. There wasn’t quite a smile on his face – nothing so extreme like that from Minho – but there was something gentle in his eyes.

You took it, swallowing, and cleaned yourself up as best as you could. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Minho pull on a pair of black sweatpants – and when he straightened up to standing, you finally clocked the blooming purple marks littered across his skin.

“Oh, fuck, your neck. I’m so sorry,” you gasped, mortified at the blooming purple marks on Minho.

He glanced towards you, and gave you half a shrug. “It’s fine.”

They were very much not fine. They were prominent, the kind of hickeys you’d be embarrassed to leave on a long-term partner, let alone a…

A…

Well, whatever Minho was.

You swallowed. “It’s not, have you seen them?”

He paused.

“…Yes,” Minho replied, firmly, and there was something about his tone that made you stop, that made you stare at him.

He stared back, face perfectly neutral but refusing to look away. The implications were not lost on you, and your face began to warm.

Clearing your throat, you set the towel by your side and reached for your clothes, having to get up to pick up each item along the shameless trail that ran from the bed to the balcony doors, gathering them in your arms in a small, pink pile. “Please tell me you have your own bathroom.”

Minho laughed a little, nodding towards the door to your right. “Where do you think I got the towel from? Through there.”

You spent a few minutes in the bathroom, trying to compose yourself, trying to clean up properly, slipping your costume back on. The strange feeling in your stomach didn’t ease up, not even once. In the mirror, you looked almost exactly the same as you had when you first stepped into Minho’s room – but how was that possible, when everything had changed?

Fuck, just…you didn’t need to think about it. Deal with it later, deal with all of it later. You just needed to get out and get some space and distance and just…

You drew yourself up as high as you could, squaring your shoulders, and pushed open the bathroom door.

You found Minho standing in the middle of the room, seemingly in mid-step, turning quickly to face you. If you didn’t know better, you’d think he was…what? Pacing?

“I can’t stay,” you stated, trying to sound firm. You mostly succeeded, were it not for the slightest hesitation you had, the faintest strain to your voice.

Minho paused, catching it immediately. “…Do you want to?”

You didn’t know how to answer that. It felt like a trap, even now, as if Minho was preparing to pull the rug out from under you. You wished you couldn’t imagine that level of cruelty, and yet you feared it, however irrational it was. “…I don’t want people to talk.”

Minho eyed you for a second, and yet again waited before he spoke, like he was trying to choose his words before they left his mouth. He settled for a very simple, very Minho statement. “Fuck people.”

At any other time, in any other situation, you would have rolled your eyes. You even felt the urge now, tied up in the same desire to go back to normal, to pretend everything was fine. “It’s not as easy as that.”

“It is,” Minho argued, but there was no irritation in his voice. Just quiet. “But I get it.”

“This was very…uh,” you swallowed. “…Impulsive.”

“Yes. It was definitely that,” he replied, and was he even capable of being any more cryptic?

You glanced away, finding it difficult to look him in the eye as you admitted, quietly. “…But, uh, good.”

Minho paused. “…Yep.”

Couldn’t he just say what he was fucking thinking? You needed to know, you needed to know if he was on the same page as you, if he was also thinking that it was too weird to just leave things like this. Silent and awkward and just…dancing around each other like this.

You swallowed, and folded your arms over your chest. You weren’t quite brave enough to look at him again yet, but you spoke up again. “Did you…have a good time too?”

And just when you were expecting another cryptic little non-response, Minho decided to cut straight to the point and catch you off-guard. “I had a great time.”

You blinked, shocked enough that your eyes darted back to him without a second thought. “…Good. That’s, uh…good.”

It was so strange to see him like this. Lee Minho, always so put-together, never a shred of vulnerability – and there he was, hair mussed, shirtless, barefoot, taking a breath as he tried to put together his next words.

“I had a great time,” he repeated. “With you. And…”

He stopped.

“And…?” You asked.

His mouth opened. Closed. And opened again. “…I…you don’t have to go.”

You felt something warm unfurl in your chest. “Minho, do you want me to stay?”

“…Yes.”

You took a step forward, tension melting from your shoulders, replaced with a new curiosity. You couldn’t quite believe this was happening, and yet…

Well, you couldn’t let him off that easily.

“Yes, what?”

He exhaled, making a sound almost akin to a huff. You recognised that sound, you knew it from debating, from arguing, from whenever you caught a weakness in his defence and pressed him on it. “Yes, I want you to stay.”

You took another step. “Why?”

This time, he scoffed, as if it could hide the slow flush of pink making its way up his neck. “You know why.”

“No, I don’t.”

He narrowed his eyes slightly, and wow, this was fun. “Yes, you do. You’re too smart not to.”

You grinned. “Thanks, but no. You’re going to have to say it.”

“You’re infuriating.”

“I am,” you said, without shame, and added. “You’re into that.”

He sighed, and gave in. “Yes, I am.”

“Well done,” you laughed, finally drawing it out of him. “You’re into me.”

Minho eyed you for a second, still just a touch out of reach. Like he’d done it on purpose, kept just enough space to protect himself.

You watched the way he hesitated, and for once, his mask slipped and his face gave away just a peek into what he was thinking. You could see the thoughts warring within his head, the way he hesitated before committing.

“…More than just that,” he said – he confessed – softly.

Just four words, but the meaning behind them was loaded. They hung in the air, obvious, weighty, vivid.

You froze, taking them in. You didn’t know why, you didn’t know how, but despite everything that had occurred tonight, Minho still had the ability to surprise you.

More than just that.

More than just…

Oh.

That was all your brain – your proudest attribute, your big, university-educated, sharp-witted genius brain – was capable of thinking.

Oh.

“So…” Minho said, before trailing off, watching you, and eventually forcing the smallest of shrugs. “Don’t go.”

You were still reeling. You tried to make it all fit, every piece of information you had. The gentleness he’d held you with, the strange softness he’d had, the look in his dark eyes when you threatened to find someone else to kiss, the way he smiled sometimes when you were trying to piss him off, the way he just…watched you in conversations, in arguments, like he was just as interested seeing you think as he was countering the words that came out of your mouth.

When you laid it out like that, when you visualised it like points in a debate – with so many in the for argument and frighteningly little in the against – it seemed so obvious.

“I…” your words came out hoarse, dazed. “…Yeah, I can…not go.”

Minho’s eyes searched every inch of you, trying to figure out what exactly you were thinking.

“…You look like you’re about to pass out,” he observed, bluntly.

“You just said you like me, can you blame me?” You asked, hysteria close to creeping into your voice.

Minho didn’t reply for a second, still watching you. “Is it such a surprise?”

“Yes,” you blurted out, instinctively, until you took a second to actually think about it. “…No? Yes and no? I don’t…you’re, like, annoyingly hard to read.”

“Am I?” Minho asked, but the corners of his lips were twitching, suggesting he already knew the answer to that. “I’d say the same about you, but honestly, sometimes you’re an open book.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Especially when you stare at my mouth.”

Your eyes snapped up back to his, blinking, caught. There was definitely amusement in his gaze now, a glimpse of relief creeping in.

You scowled, face beginning to heat. “You’re enjoying this.”

He smiled, not a trace of hesitation behind it, a real and genuine smile, and finally stepped towards you. “I absolutely am.”

“Assho–”

You were cut off, as Minho ducked his head down to kiss you, and you couldn’t even pretend to do anything other than respond eagerly.

The next time the two of you got coffee, on another cold autumn morning when you were ten minutes deep into a squabble over geopolitics that you were determined to win, Seungmin had the grace to at least act surprised when Minho bought you a muffin and slipped his arm around your waist.

“Wow,” he murmured, deadpan, watching the way you relaxed into Minho’s side, even as you unpicked every thread of his argument. “Gee. Who would have guessed?"

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